Diskordia
Staff: Andrew Blackman
Overview:
A kinda of trippy “Alice in Wonderland” kind of thing going on here.
Review:
So today I am taking a step into madness and reviewing Diskordia #1. This is another one from a team that contacted me and I reviewed. So without further ado, let’s jump down the rabbit hole.
The art is bizarre and weird, but meshes with the aesthetic (dare I say it defines it?) and is well drawn. Sometimes I can’t tell if they are being sloppy of stylistic though and while the junky madness vibe they are going for can be engaging I can’t help but wonder if I am giving them too much credit. However, later in the comic there are these odd “chibi” heads that pop up and kind of rips you kicking and screaming from the comic’s immersive grasp.
Also, this is definitely a 18+ comic*. Tits everywhere and slogans like “Penis for President” are kind of the status quo here but it works. It’s kind of a fun little “fuck you” to more tame comics and it works with the aesthetic they are trying to establish.
(*Not sure why I’ve done so many 18+ recently. I try to avoid them generally.)
The lettering bugs me on the first page. It’s near impossible to read and really doesn’t serve much point but otherwise it is pretty solid. The yellow on black text at first kind of annoyed me but when they are using such a dark color pallet I understood why they made the choice. They took a chance and it turned out pretty well. It preserved the right tone for the comic while being sufficiently
So I’m going to go on a rant here. There are far too many comics, movies, and games out there that do the “gothic Alice” sort of “madness” thing. Personally, I don’t dig it. It’s never been my thing. Like that whole Zenescope Wonderland thing, not my cup of tea. Diskordia kind of dips into that rather than marinating itself in it and to be fair the result is a whole lot better than the rest (also… it’s nothing like Zenescope’s artstyle).
Ultimately, this comic’s plot is incoherent. It moves from stock set up to stock set up with some big set pieces for their own sake (and maybe shock value). I get that comic called “Diskordia” might be entitled to a bit of craziness but it didn’t feel like it had a point. I get it was following drugged up logic, and suspension of logic due to an unreliable narration is ok, but it felt like a lot of the scenes were not chosen not for their part in a larger story but rather to set up for some sort of line delivery. That’s not to say it wasn’t a fun read and the art alone is probably worth checking out.
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