Tag Archives: scott gladstein

Where I Have Been For the Last Four Months?

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Clock_King_1

So let’s go over the big question I’ve got a few times, “Hey Scott, where were you for the last four months or so?”.The short answer is “busy”. The long answer is “very busy”. I recently left my day job to pursue my MBA full time, rather than part time. I’ve also been spending time finishing up writing duties on two separate independent comic series “Good Samaritans” and “Vis”. That’s right- now you guys can make fun of my comics like I do to yours (revenge is sweet isn’t it?). I’ve had the pleasure of working with some absolutely fantastic artists and editors during this process and it has been very illuminating.

 

That being said you can now check out my first comic, Good Samaritans #1 for FREE on DriveThruRPG and keep up with my work on Facebook at Scott Gladstein Presents.

 

The United

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The United

Staff: Melchizedek Todd

Overview:

An honest to God solid Christian multi-publisher crossover.

Review:

Ok so today I am going to do something a little different. I normally review only Issue #1s but today I am going to take a look at “The United” which, while technically a #1, is actually a mega crossover event between 10 Christian themed superheroes. I am totally in support of Indie crossovers and I was very excited to come across this one. For better or for worse- I am going to check out The United #1. Let’s give it a look.

Lettering & Layout

The layout is very reader friendly- as a 10 character crossover has to be. We have a character page with headshots and names of all the characters and when we are introduced to them we are given a small blurb about their abilities. This is helpful and not super intrusive.

The lettering is not fantastic. The introduction uses some very stock fonts in big, poorly laid out, exposition blocks. In panel the lettering is odd. Sometimes it is stretched or warped oddly but you can read it without issue.

Art

The art style is very stroke-heavy and is something I’d more expect to see in a horror comic but it is very detailed and it works. Someone obviously put a lot of love into the art for this comic and it shows. There are some anatomical oddities and inconsistencies but overall it’s fluid and is more a stylistic thing than anything. My only other real complaint is that due to the high contract and stroke-heavy nature of the art sometimes it is a little hard to follow if there is a large number of characters on the page. While not on the professional level- it isn’t a bad attempt and every scene has a plethora of “things” going on (as opposed to the empty background a lot of indie comics have).

Story

What we get out of this comic is a good old-fashioned superhero beatdown. I was skeptical of this comic until about page 7 because that page features a whole host (see what I did there? pun pun) of heroes just beating the living hell (I got a million of these) out of some robots on a beautifully done splash-page. THIS is what crossover comics are about.

In short, they have all been summoned by what is essentially the Devil (who has a rather fun and unique character design). A lot of Christian comics I have reviewed in the past were very preachy and (pardon the pun) black and white about morality. “God is good” is the only message we get and we are never introduced to the complexities of matters of morality and faith. I’m not religious and that always put me off about them. This comic doesn’t do that however. Right off the bat we are given some very valid reasons as to why God is a jerk by the antagonist. He talks about how God turns his back on the weak, punishes the innocent, and is wrathful at seemingly random times. While we (as readers) and the heroes are never going to side with the Devil on this one- this is a legitimate test of faith for the characters. We get some good back and forth from these characters and they show their devotion in their own way. Some quote biblical passages, some are silent, and some show their colors by simply quipping back but no one falters in their faith. A scumbag even calls them, “super-powered Jesus freaks” and that shows that the writer is not afraid to address the absurdity of the premise within the context of the real world. It makes it more believable and human- something a lot of superhero comics lack.

If there is a weakness to this comic- it is the overall plot. We have a bunch of kind of directionless plot threads that are just kind of thrown at us. They are fun visually but we aren’t made privy to exactly why some things are happening or what their overall goal is. Honestly- I wasn’t looking for Les Miserables from a massive crossover book but it would have been nice to see a more coherent story put together all the same.

Overall

Overall- this comic defied my expectations. I expected to get a moralizing yuppy Christian book with a bunch of, as the comic puts it, “superpowered Jesus freaks” but what I got was a lot of fun. It was a fast paced beat ‘em up with more characters than I could shake a stick at. It wasn’t overly long and while the overall direction was a bit messy it had a very good approach to the whole concept. Give it a read.

 

Metrics

Art: 5/10 (Stylized and decent. Not pro.)

Lettering: 3/10 (Not professional)

Plot: 5/10 (A realistic world with some interesting moral questions but lacks direction overall)

Novelty: 8/10 (A GOOD Christian comic? This is a white whale.)

Overall: 5/10 (but go read it)

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Project Chrysalis

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Project Chrysalis

Staff: Amit Chauhan

Overview:

A train wreck with clipped photography for art.

Review:

The cover of “Project Chrysalis” tells me this comic is about “A corporation with a history of evil and atrocities” and that “A girl stumbles upon her new superhuman abilities” and features some terraced photography with a filter on it. Well… that doesn’t fill me with confidence that this will be a good book. However, I’ll take it at face value and give it a fair shot. Let’s jump into Project Chrysalis.

Art

Oh lord. The art. The ART. Yep- this is another trace/filter comic where everything is done from stock images and it is beautifully bad. I’ve missed this sort of artwork. It’s bad and there is really nothing worse. I suppose that it does, in fact, get the point across without hiring an actual artist. It isn’t until page 7 that the full impact of just how bad this art is hits us. We have our protagonist superimposed over stock backgrounds. She is clearly cropped out of the photos that were taken of her (or maybe of stock images?), run though a gain filter and plopped right there onto a layer above stock images. Her perspectives are all off, her expressions laughably exaggerated for a real person, and the next effect is something akin to looking at the collage of a 13 year old girl.

Lettering

The lettering was done by someone with a copy of Adobe Illustrator who just up and decided they wanted to try their hand at lettering one day. We have a very thick text for the first third of the book while we get an exposition dump and some rather basis lettering done in the second half. It’s all legible but feels very “basis” and amateurish.

Story

Plotwise we are using the (shakes magic mysterious historical event 8 Ball) Nazi Tibet expedition as the basis for some superhero hijinks. There is something about a husk-god and Nazis but we cut away from that in favor of meeting our protagonist. We get a whole montage of her groaning in pain and get some tell-don’t-show narration telling us what’s going on. The premise is that the Nazis retrieved a husk from Tibet and now in modern day due to some science-fu the husk is alive (and apparently an attractive young girl). She has superpowers and starts to fight the evil organization that is trying to catch her (for those playing along at home- that is trope #23 on the “Generic Superhero” plot list).

Let’s talk about the narration for a second. It is pretentious and almost as bad as the art. It talks about how a chrysalis (you know- the cocoon thing that hatches into a butterfly) is a catalyst for change, a new beginning then goes on to say how it is devoid of any imperfection, and that the word itself is derived from the greek word for gold. What?! The word “catalyst” is misused because it’s not the cause of the change- it’s the result. It is certainly not devoid of imperfections as many caterpillars don’t emerge due to defects. Finally… what does gold have to do with any of this (other than linking it to the next like “all that glitters is not gold”). The dialogue in this comic is just painfully pretentious (please turn on a Park song of your choice at this point for full effect) with lines like “tears from someone in despair are the kind of thing that pierces even the coldest of souls” and “Then you have to go through the humiliation of being spanked on the rear end….” (couldn’t say butt there?). I wish I was making this stuff up.

Overall

Overall, this is a joke. The cover set us up exactly for what was on the inside. It’s a pretentious mess that tries to hide how bland and samey it is. The art is the cherry on top- probably having been made with the aid of a bunch of very excited friends of the staff. This is apparently part of the Tiber Saga and if the rest of the comics in it (the other 2) and I’m glad I caught this one first so I know not to read the rest. Hey- at least it is a free comic… so at least you don’t have to ask for your money back if you bought it.

 

Metrics

Art: 1/10 (Cropped photos with a filter over some stock art)

Lettering: 4/10 (A little basic but it works)

Plot: 2/10 (Pretentious and unfocused)

Novelty: 1/10 (Derivative)

Overall: 2/10

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Brake

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Brake

Staff: Shane Will, Nicholas Garza

Overview:

A ham-fisted attempt to make a Muslim superhero.

Review:

Today we are looking at “Brake”, a short, 7-page, superhero comic about a Muslim superhero (I don’t normally read the sales blurb, but I happened to catch it). This is apparently the origin story for a member of a comic universe (known collectively as the “Tomorrowverse”) by CK Comics and Scattered Comics. Let’s jump on into “Brake”.

Art

The art is not great. it gets the point across but there are some wonky angles, bizarre and inconsistent anatomy, and it all looks very low grade. The scenes are empty sometimes and the poses pretty exaggerated even by comic standards. The shadows, though done in the standard high-contrast fashion, are more or less random. There was a point on page 5 & 6 (of the PDF) that I thought his costume had an odd fan-shaped pattern on his forehead as it is in 5 panels it is there but later on we see that it was just intended to be shadow- despite him moving and us getting several angles on him.

Lettering

The lettering is not bad, but it was clearly done by someone new to the art. Sometimes the way the balloons are placed makes it difficult to tell who is talking in what order. A minor issue is that, since the site I got the comic from watermarks things, the bottom of the pages look like a jumbled mess because they place white text on the black bleed. Not a big deal, but most comics avoid putting things into the bleed for reasons like this.

Story

So I give this comic props- it tackles a very difficult topic. The opening narration talks about how the teachings if Islam are bad being perverted by an group of extremists few and not all Muslims are evil. This is a very bold stance to take in the current climate but one I happen to agree with. If I can soapbox here for a moment, every belief (be it religious, national, cultural, and even philosophical) has their extremists and we shouldn’t judge the group as a whole for their more radical parts. Radicalism has little to do with the nature or teachings of the group and more just serves as the glue that binds them- it could literally be anything that meets a few criteria. However, this comic handles this delicate topic about as subtly as a toddler with a hammer.

The first page sets up the universe with a exposition dump delivered ala the news. The world is full of superheroes, the war in the middle east is ongoing, anti-muslim sentiments are running hot and there is a superhero named “Tomorrow” who is from the future that our protagonist is inspired by. Oddly enough for an origin story, we just get a few lines of narration to explain his backstory. He was in a car accident and suddenly he was invulnerable.

The dialogue is pretty heavy in this comic- a lot of “tell” rather than “show”. Honestly, a lot of the first few pages could have been shown visually rather than exposited about in narration (show some images of Tomorrow on the news, some anti-muslim rallies, give us 2 panels giving him his origin and power, and finally show the protagonist making the costume like we get). This is a problem with a lot of indie comics and indie superhero comics in particular. We are told everything rather than shown anything. For example, we get a panel where a villain pulls a gun and one guy yells, “Look out!!!” and another guy screams, “He’s got a gun!” but their poses and expressions already convey that.

Overall the plot is about as generic as it could be, relying on a lot of tropes of the genre. The protagonist, Bahir Azeem, got superpowers and was inspired by another hero to action. He is Muslim and I mean SUPER and stereotypically Muslim. Every scene he is either praying, talking about something related to his faith, or giving exposition. It’s like when a female character is in the cast and it is painfully obvious that she is “the girl” and that about sums her entire character up, except in this case Bahir is 100% defined by his religion. I can respect this comic for trying to give us a Muslim hero- but a cardboard cutout with the word “Allah” would have had more depth.

The comic ends with some sickeningly derivative scenes of the hero punching the villain and then being locked in jail 2 panels later and is followed by the generic scene of the hero shaking hands with the political leader while looking at the crowd waving one hand. This seems like something out of a 80s TV show, but it falls really flat and feels super stale. I’ve read PSAs and propaganda pieces that were more subtle than this. In fact- that’s exactly what this feels like; a propaganda comic. I mean I know it’s really just ham-fisted writing, the best intentions gone wrong, and an over-reliance on superhero tropes but that is what it feels like. Like a PSA or propaganda piece in that they rely on high moralizing and dramatics over any sort of substance. We are TOLD that the Muslims are being treated ill but we never see Bahir experience this sort of prejudice. The villain’s motives might as well be “to ruin Christmas” because it ultimately amount to “Because I’m evil!”.

Overall

In conclusion- don’t read this comic if you want a good story about a Muslim superhero. Go check out G. Willow Wilson’s fantastic run on Ms. Marvel featuring Kamala Khan or the New 52 Nightrunner comic. Both feature much more developed Muslim characters than this one dimensional schlock.

 

Metrics

Art: 3/10 (Low quality but gets the point across more or less.)

Lettering: 4/10 (Armature but readable.)

Plot: 1/10 (One-dimensional and formulaic.)

Novelty: 1/10 (Derivative.)

Overall: 2.25/10

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Spring Heeled Jack

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Spring Heeled Jack

Staff: Tony Deans, Martha Laverick, Joshua Cozine

Overview:

Something is just not right about this horror comic.

Review:

Today we’ve got another horror comic. This time rather than some generic monster we have Spring-Heeled Jack. For those not familiar with the myth Jack is a character out of victorian England and was something of an urban legend. He has some connections to devil (eyes of fire, clawed hands, etc) and some “gentlemanly” aspects to his appears. He has appeared in a lot of media and has been adapted into many comics over the years. That being said, let’s jump into Spring-Heeled Jack and see if this is “just another Spring-Heeled Jack comic” of if it is something special!

Art & Lettering

The art isn’t my favorite style but it’s well done and fits the comic’s tone. It’s done in a style that shows a lot of the brushstrokes and uses a very flat pallet. It’s a good mood setter and it’s well-drawn with a lot of use of shadow and contrast. When we finally see Jack a few pages in he matches his description though have a very “vampiric” quality about him. The lettering is clean and legible however- exactly how it needs to be and it matches the feel well enough.

The second act totally changes everything. While the same art style is used, without the heavy shadow and dark colors to hide it- there is some sloppy art. There are a few instances of odd and inconsistent proportions, some panels lacked background that should probably have them, and the character designs are not as novel in this sort of light. It takes on some vaguely manga inspired aspects later and it kind of clashes a little (though one could argue that there is a pervasive influence that is just more highlighted more later on).

Story

There is not a lot of dialogue but that shows an understanding of the medium. I’d be surprised if the first act of the book had more than 100 words of dialogue- but it doesn’t need it. This is a good example of how to “show” not “tell”. It starts with a chase and we are not inundated with exposition about the situation. It just “happens” and we are given enough context clues to figure out the rest.

I gotta say- I was not a big fan of making this a Sherlock Holmes story. Half way through we are introduced to “Mr. Arthur Doyle”, a not-so-subtle Holmes pastiche (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote the Holmes stories). I’ll give them credit- the character looks like the real life Doyle a bit so that’s a nice little touch. I am not sure if they meant it to BE him or to be someone LIKE him. We also have his Lestrad stand in “O’Brien” and his Wattson stand in “Joe” (though he is a fair bit more astute and active than his literary counterpart). Joe is based on Joseph Bell, a forensic surgeon who Holmes was based on in part. I’m 90% sure they are posing this as some sort of historical fiction with supernatural elements but it just kind of feels like they are using it for the sake of name recognition.

We see Jack do some supernatural things (breath fire, take bullet hits without issue, and some claws) and the “law” of Holmes is that while something may seem supernatural- it never is. Science and deductive witt always shines light on it and it is revealed to be a sham. Part of me really hopes the story ends in that fashion but I get this feel like it would be a bit of a let down at the same time. We have the titular character seemingly possessed of supernatural abilities and this is one of the only aspect of the comic left in questions really so if it was all some stage magic or something I feel like that might take some of the “umph” out of the excellent first scene.

Overall

Overall, despite my gripes about it, this is not a bad comic. It’s not a godsend but it’s pretty inoffensive next to things like HellOhGirl or Kinesis or whatnot. If this is your kind of thing you are going to enjoy it. I wasn’t particularly thrilled. It started off good and the art is interesting but the rest kind of falls flat. For something 23 pages long not much happens and it doesn’t quite resolve itself. That is not to say that it needs to in the 1st issue, but I can’t say I’m terribly interested to see where Mr. Doyle goes. All and all, Spring Heeled Jack is your basic boogie-man despite his name.

Metrics

Art: 4/10 (Great at times but other times it is unsuccessful.)

Lettering: 5/10 (It works well.)

Plot: 4/10 (Nothing special and some odd historical choices.)

Novelty: 5/10 (Hey- it takes a shot at doing something new, I’ll give it credit for that.)

Overall: 4.5/10

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Parallel Man

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Parallel Man

Staff: Jeffrey Morris, Fredrick Haugen, Christopher Jones, and Dylan Hansen

Overview:

Professional with a great premise.

Review:

So Parallel Man relies on the concept of the “multiverse”- a series of infinite (or near infinite) interconnected alternate universes just next door to each other. This is a concept very much steeped in the lore of American comics as this is the universal logic employed by most major publishers to tie their stories together. The premise of this comic is original- in the vastness of the multiverse one version of America developed the ability to jump to different realities and conquer them because they destroyed their own world. I’m sold on the premise and the cover art looks gorgeous so let’s jump in and see if it delivers!

 

Art

The art is top notch. It is done in a style similar to that of most major publishers and doesn’t fail to impress. You guys know I’m something of an art snob- but this is done with a deep understanding of the medium. It’s in full color, uses dynamic angles, and it’s expressive. They have some very invocative imagery- a shattered Lincoln memorial implies a loss of freedom, Air Force One, and an alternatively colored american flag. Hey- they even got Obama in there for a bit and did a fair likeness of him.

I gotta say though, for all the high praise I am laying on this thing, when we finally get to see the universe-jumping military their appearance fails to impress. The big intro on page 9 just kind of looks like a line of very cookie cutter soldiers in generic “space soldier” style armor of the same height and build. Given the details on earlier pages, I was ready for some realistically diverse and very imaginative soldiers- not something that bland. However- that is about the only misstep in the creativity department (see the story section for more on that).

 

Lettering

The lettering makes me envious. They do more than just your standard boxes and onomatopoeia. The text is legible, the onomatopoeia is creatively applied, and non-interruptive to the beautiful art. They use a variety of balloon and font styles, when appropriate, and it just adds to the already very professional appearance of the comic. Honestly- if I didn’t know better, I would assume that this was something produced by Marvel, DC, or Image.

 

Story

There are some kind of over the top names for things like “hellfighters” and a lot of techno jargon that is meant to sound scientific, but overall the writing is a solid B+ or A-. It does its job and does its word building without giving us too bad of an exposition bomb (aided by the first page’s short introduction). The dialogue comes off as natural and does a great job handling such a weird premise.

When compared to the overall direction thus far- the worldbuilding is the shining gem. The premise works and is used to great effect. We are immersed in the world of the reality-hopping Nick Morgan and his sidekick, a computer program named Atlas.The various universes we get to see showcase the powerful imagination (both in an artistic and worldbuilding sense) that this team can bring. We see megalithic vehicles, crazy alien designs, mushroom forests, . They do rely on “science as magic” a bit heavily and kind of ham-handedly in the narrative sense (a “nanopatches fix everything” kind of setup) but I think it was done to keep the focus of the comic on the premise rather than the minor details. We get a slow-ish start with the real plot kicking in about half way through the first issue and don’t really get a full understanding of it until about 10 pages before the end. That’s not to say there is a pacing issue, more that they handle it pretty well. There is a bit of tonal shift near the end that I wasn’t so fond of, but it looks like it will set up some interesting character dynamics in later issues.

 

Overall

Overall, I dig it. It’s a solid premise with a lot of mileage in its premise. The first issue does a great job of setting up a lot of issues to come. This comic is about as professional as indies get- great art and some solid writing. I’m on-board with this one.

 

Metrics

Art: 8/10 (Downright professional)

Lettering: 8/10 (Above and beyond)

Plot: 6/10 (Solid across the board)

Novelty: 10/10 (Gotta love this premise and the way they handle it!)

Overall: 8/10

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(They also have some other Parallel Man media like games and stuff on the site- totally worth a look.)

Theodicy

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Theodicy

Staff: Chad Handley, Fernando Brazuna, Ryan Boltz, Minan Ghibliest, Kel Nuttall

Overview:

A heavy handed comic about Jesus themed superheroes in cartel-run Mexico that is way better than how I am describing it.

Review:

Next on the agenda is “Theodicy”. You can actually follow along with this review HERE. I was promised blasphemy and, in honor of the holiday encroaching on Thanksgiving- I’m all for it (Seriously? Why is there Christmas music in the middle of November).

In terms of lettering, we have a few times when the letters could be larger but it’s all legible so no complaints here.
The art isn’t bad but it’s not professional either. It’s about 75% of the way to being professional but there are still some odd expressions and odd rendering of the contours of human faces (sometimes really flat, sometimes really detailed). Some of the rendering of the clothes they wear are draw in a fashion that doesn’t reflect the nature of the material (leather jackets seem to work just like cotton does) and there is some minor continuity errors artistically.

To say the plot is heavy handed is a grievous understatement. The good guys are TOO good and the bad guys are puppy-kickingly evil. It’s about a subtle as an episode of blue clues. Exposition is pretty doled out by the spoonful on page 6 but even with that generous helping of plot details I am still left awestruck by the randomly unexplained man with giant black wings that no one seems to notice/care. The names of the characters on the pinups are all very generic (seriously… the Chinese dude is named “Wushu” and the other one is “Wuxia”?)

Despite all the flaws of this comic… yeah I liked it. It has charm and personality. The religious aspect of comics like this which normally kind of bothers me… didn’t. I dug these priests and after I saw the pin ups I was like, “Holy shit*! Super-priests in cartel run Mexico dishing out the hurt to Evil McEvilson? Sign me up!” It’s just rough and dark enough to take the “sunday school” aspect out of it and almost parody that sort of “Jesus is my best friend!” comic. I REALLY hope they go farther with that and the preview of issue #2 really showed that they are. Call me crazy but I’m interested.
*Pun pun pun

 

Metrics

Art: 4/10 (Not bad, not good)

Lettering: 5/10 (Average)

Plot: 3/10 (Issue #1 is slow and the writing is a little heavy handed but it has character and a good set up for the future)

Novelty: 8/10 (I dig the premise!)

Overall: 5/10

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Pirouette

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Pirouette

Staff: Mark Miller, Carlos Granda

Overview:

A high quality indie dark comic about abusive clowns

Review:

Ok so today I will be looking at Mark Miller’s comic “Pirouette”. It’s got some crazy circus stuff on the cover and some decent art so let’s follow this rabbit hole to wonderland and see where we end up! (Reader note: This is an excessively graphic comic and if you are squeamish don’t read it).

 

The art is terribly dark but it fits with the theme and the paneling really furthers that tone. That being said, the art is fantastic, rivaling some of the best work I’ve seen in the industry. There is exquisite details and the artist really knows how to stick to his chosen color pallet. Each character is visually distinct and memorable. Of note, is that this comic has a really high production value. Someone REALLY dug this comic so my hat (or maybe mask?) is off to publisher Black Mask for their superb quality and care.

 

Something I always like is good typography and page 1 we have some very interesting use of lettering. It comes in the form of a retro “headline” style display (where many bulbs are used to form letters) that spells the comic’s name and has a few burnt out and smoking bulbs at the end. This sets up the comic to draw a lot from circus mystique and have a darker undertone. I gotta say, I absolutely hate the full page spread panels on this comic. It really ruins the flow and sometimes I really wished they’d relegated certain parts to smaller panels (even the establishing shots). I love the choice of lettering, it’s very expressive while still being legible. Sometimes it makes the text (particularly on e-readers) look very very small and difficult to read.

 

The tone is very dark and the plot is equally so. In the very broad strokes, it’s about a young female clown who has a rough life in the circus and we get to see all the pain she suffers. The characters are memorable, if only visually, and you kind of see everything coming. Nothing that is going to blow your mind but as far as stories go, it is a very human one. The writer has a great grasp of tone and metaphor but sometimes is a little too on the head. The dialogue is well written and intertwines a lot of colloquialisms well. Again, a few stick out as odd or out of place but on the whole they work well. They do passable on the humor aspect but it really feels like this comic’s strength comes from it’s believable (if not decidedly dark) characters. The plot of the first issue didn’t really do anything for me and the hook at the end kind of made me shrug. It does seem like it is going somewhere but not somewhere I am really, personally, interested in.

 

Overall, it’s a comic that is exactly what you see on the label. It is a dark comic about circus life and if that’s your cup of tea (read the comic…that’s a funny joke) you will enjoy it. Comes for the art and stay for the elephant poop and clowns.

Metrics

Art: 7/10 (Damn good)

Lettering: 5/10 (Does some interesting things but has a few minor errors.)

Plot: 2/10 (Kind of left me bored… and this is a comic with abusive clowns!)

Novelty: 3/10 (Nothing new under the sun)

Overall: 4.25/10

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Jackdaw

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Jackdaw

Staff: Kelly Shane, Brian Barr

Overview:

Watchmen, but for Batman.. and way better than even that sounds.

Review:

So today’s review is of Jackdaw issue #1. As per normal, I go in knowing next to nothing but if the cover is any indication- I’m already interested in it because the second page has a Beatles quote for the title of this issue (“Into the Light of the Dark Black Night”) and who doesn’t love “Blackbird”?. For those who don’t know a “jackdaw” is a bird in the crow family so the fitting title makes me smile a bit. Anyway, lets jump into Jackdaw #1!

Right off the bat the art is something you’ll have to get use to. It’s done in very dark pencils with and has a very sketchy style. The anatomy of the characters and scene composition is well done, playing a lot with lights and darks, but there are some clear issues. I hesitate to call them such because of the “style” but it looks like this went from sketch to linework and then someone just kind of stopped before they inked it so there are lots of little like blemishes and imperfections. Whatever I say though- at the end of the day I LOVE the art for some reason. I normally HATE dark comics (having read a lot of them) but this just looks downright cool. I don’t know if it is the very “real world” style the characters are rendered in or the sketchy tone and use of white space but… I just love it. Now, if it wasn’t for that layout….

So I need to talk about the layout. It’s nowhere near as professional as it could be. They have white strips on either side of some pages, the lettering totally clashes with the style of the page, and it all looks very amateurish. The lettering stands out like a sore thumb, being rendered in crisp vector (or a solid raster program) with the rest of the comic contrastingly in that sketchy dark pencil style. They clash violently in a visual sense and it is really distracted. Add to that the way the words are crammed into the scene like the artist forgot to leave room for the dialogue boxes and the small amount of border-space on the text itself and you have a very messy comic. Sometimes the black boxes use for internal narration get lost on the dark pencils (see page 26) and it all could use a good formatting guy.  It really WANT this comic to have fantastic layout! It makes it seem like an idea half executed! If the art style had been crisp and clean the vector lettering would have worked! Conversely if we had some awesome, built in, hand-lettered, dialogue boxes we’d have a very dark and moody visual set up!

Alright, so back to the good stuff. Can I gush for a second about how much I love the character designs? Jackdaw is clearly cut for the batman line of dark pulpy heroes (and my frequent readers will recall my affection for pulp) and I can really dig the points of inspiration that inform the reader visually of who he is. He has the dark brooding cape, the impassive white eyes, the heavy belt with tools on it, and the plague doctor mask. We have his sidekick (though she dislikes the term) Thresher and she has a bit of the “robin” aspect to her- talking about how she is used as a distraction. Some of the dialogue reminds me of the “good soldier” line from Dark Knight Returns and it’s not so far off in tone (though without the Frank Miller brand of madness). I get a very nightwing vibe from her (particularly the Young Justice version).

If you see a pattern here it’s not by accident. It really feels like the author wished they could just write their own Elseworlds batman story but couldn’t afford to get in with DC. It’s a bit of an elephant in the room. Like we have campy stand-ins for the Adam West batman series and it all feels like a pastiche. The writing is good and it gives is a good way to easily identify/make assumptions about the setting but it really undercuts the entire comic when you get down to it. As much as I like the comic at time it feels really cheap- like there is nothing new coming my way and it’s just a love-letter to the batman franchise. We even have a Harley Quinn & (mentioned) Joker rip-off. The realization grew on me, like it took 2/3rds of the comic to really get bad and part of me still wants to like it. It feels very much like what Watchmen did for superheroes- put them in the real world and have them work out their problems in a very raw way… except with just the batman universe. Part of me REALLY likes that and part of me thinks it’s REALLY in bad taste.

Dialogue wise we have a few good ones. It’s very “raw” dialogue (“My ball sac contracted just watching. But less about my scrotum and more about this secret weapon.”) and I can dig the tone. It involves a lot of modern ways fans interact with the comic medium (various TV shows, movies, message boards, websites, YouTube, etc) and it’s all done really well. The pacing doesn’t follow a three act structure or anything (then again episodic media, comics in particular, rarely does) but has a lot of great vignettes strung together. I don’t know if the plot really resolves itself or gives us bait for issue #2 but… damn. It’s still well written and I’d love to get my hands on issue #2.


Alright so overall, despite the flaws and things I bitched and moaned about… I friggen love this comic. I really do. Maybe it’s because it is such a love letter to batman or because it does such a good job of putting superheroes in the real world. This comic has all the things I profess to hate in indie comics: generic superheroes, obvious pastiches, cliche dialogue, etc… but god does it work. It just goes to show that if you have a good writer anything is possible. Seriously, this is the indie version of Watchmen. If you are reading some dime-a-dozen New 52 or Marvel Next comic, put it down for a month and read a single issue of this. There is so much more heart in this one issue than in a decade’s worth of schlock of those sort of comics.

 

Metrics

Art: 7/10 (Drawn intentionally rough, but it makes a mood and works so well.)

Lettering: 3/10 (Sloppy)

Plot: 9/10 (A character focused tour de force and commentary on our age)

Novelty: 5/10 (Watchmen, but with Batman and social media)

Overall: 6/10

Link to Product

Link to Website

Super

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Super

Staff: Joshua Crowther, Bruno Chiroleu, Matteo Baldrighi, Chas Pangburn, Steven Forbes

Overview:

A complex comic with good art.

Review:

So armed only with a blurb (“What happens when a superhero tries to solve a real world crisis? With no super villains is the world already saved?”) I am going to jump into “Super”. I gotta say, I am concerned with a name like “Super” and that premise it is going to fall into that trap of doing the same kind “generic” superhero comic I end up reviewing a lot. However, I hope it will blow my mind and not fall into those traps.

So, out of the gate Super has beautiful artwork. Full color, beautiful use of perspective and gradient, and lettering that it top notch. A lot of comics can be done in color or in black and white with little difference to the overall quality. However, Super goes the extra mile and really utilizes color to it’s fullest. For example, there is a panel where a man is lit on fire and while he is drawn with lights and darks (and color) the fire itself has a different color stroke and the whole scene’s color pallet is select to illustrate the scene. Beautiful! Just beautiful. A super minor (very technical) gripe is that there are a few panels where the artwork crossed into the bleed a bit (example: Page 14).

While we are on the visuals, the lettering deserves a special kind of thumbs up. The dialogue boxes help inform the reader of the style of communication and visually communicate it well (the shape/style of radio communication is visually represented by a special kind of dialogue box for example). However, there are a few missteps. Sometimes the arrangement of the dialogue boxes are done in such a way that you don’t know which comes first and which comes next. You can normally figure it out, but it’s a pain on occasion that  requires a few re-reads. Let’s be clear however, the lettering is solid and that’s just a drop in the bucket.

Some of the dialogue is well written but other times it feels like it’s just forcing itself to sound contemporary and relevant- a rehash of the common sentiments of most Americans of the younger generation. While I applaud the topic of the discussions, I don’t know if it was particularly well written. There are some pastiches of relevant themes that might as well have just been called out by name. To be honest? I got really boring. Like if this was new information or a unique situation informing the reader of some setting-specific information it would have been interesting. However, if I had wanted a recap of the Iraq war I could have just read Wikipedia. The comic also bounces around chronologically a lot and it’s a little hard to follow, but I get why they do it.

Now on the story. It’s very concerned with being topical and relevant. I can’t really decide if I hate it or love it and as a reviewer- I don’t know if that’s a good thing. On one hand it’s got a LOT of potential and the main character has a lot of room he can grow into. I get the feeling that this is not one of those series that shows its colors in the first issue and I am going to have to hold judgement on it as a whole until it has done it’s full run. Make no mistake- if pulled off right this is going to be a hell of a good comic. However, as a self-contained first issue I am going to strongly recommend it. If not for the art, for the potentially great story that seems to be coming. My concerns over it being a “generic” superhero comic were allayed. It uses it more as a way to question the relationship between the relationship of moral responsibility and power (both on a geo-political and personal scale). The faults are that it’s depressing and preachy. If it keeps this up- I it’s going to get really old really fast. If we have some sort of apotheosis sometimes soon (or at least a glance at what that could entail) it could really save the series from it’s own potential downfall.

So yeah, overall- I recommend it. It’s a complex look into some geo-political stuff and if that is your bag give it a read. If not, it is probably not for you.

 

Metrics

Art: 9/10 (Better than the big boys)

Lettering: 7/10 (Solidly above average)

Plot: 5/10 (Has potential to be really good or really bad.)

Novelty: 6/10 (I don’t know if it’s new, but it’s at least not derivative)

Overall: 6.75/10

Link to Kickstarter for Issue #2