See my review at Goodreads.com: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1182005733 ODY-C #1 by Matt Fraction
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Probably more like 2.5 Stars.

I love Greek mythology. I loved the Odyssey the first few times I read it. The Iliad and every subsequent rendition of the Trojan War held my attention. Now we have a Greek Odyssey in space. I'm not sure what to do with this.

First issues are difficult. Second and third issues debatably...

Decent, but had a ton of potential to tell a fascinating story about what it means to be a hero or a villain.

Kind of a shaky start. Sejic both writes and does all the artwork for this series, which is in itself impressive. The writing is a bit jarring, with a few too many one-liners and not enough character building. That being said, the following two issues are drastically better and the series is certainly worth following along with.

High quality artwork, and the story begins to get interesting.

Definitely a lot more solid than the last two (which were in no way bad.) The artwork is absolutely stunning, beautiful, and creepy all in one, and the fact that Sejic produces both the writing and artwork by himself is simply amazing. My only complaint is his overuse of !!exclamation marks!!

This has a lot of potential. The end notes from the author say that the beginning of the story is a bit weird, which it is... kind of. It's more of a sporadic mess, but it lays good groundwork to build a story upon. First issues can be difficult. The point of a comic is to tell a story, and to do that you need to lay groundwork, build a world, give a bit of a back-story, introduce characters... in a normal novel, this can take 150-200 pages. In a comic book, you have one issue to hook. I'd say Brandon and Klein forfeited a bit of the hook in order to produce a first issue that lends a lot of potential for a great overall story arc.

What a solid beginning to a creepy-crawly, get-in-your-head comic book series! Snyder writes wonderfully and Jock's artwork is extraordinary.

Really well developed. Great artwork and fantastic writing!

So good! I'm loving this so far.

Such a tremendously written, bizarre story. A bit graphic at times, but such is life. The art is phenomenal! Everything about this series is 10+.

Deep State Vol. 1 by Justin Jordan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a review for Issue #1 and #2.

After not understanding (a.k.a highly disliking) BOOM!'s publication of God Hates Astronauts, Vol. 1, I retreated to the my safe alcove of Image and Vertigo comics. Recently at the comic book store, which is admittedly one of the best places to spend my Wednesday mornings, I heard praise for Deep State Vol. 1. I then saw the last copies of issues #1 and #2 sitting on the new series rack and since they looked like they needed a home, and the art looked fucking awesome, I decided to give BOOM! another shot.

I am so happy I did.

The first issue is gripping, well drawn, well colored, and damn-well written. This is going to be a big story among those of us who love mature content and superheroless comic books.

From Issue #1:
"The problem with secrets is that they don't want to stay that way. They say information wants to be free.
And maybe that's the case.
But what I do know is that every story wants to be told.
You can bury them as deep as you want. You can hide them. You can toss them into the darkest places you can imagine, but sooner or later...
They always come back."

Deep State Vol. 1 by Justin Jordan
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This is a review for Issue #1 and #2.

After not understanding (a.k.a highly disliking) BOOM!'s publication of God Hates Astronauts, Vol. 1, I retreated to the my safe alcove of Image and Vertigo comics. Recently at the comic book store, which is admittedly one of the best places to spend my Wednesday mornings, I heard praise for Deep State Vol. 1. I then saw the last copies of issues #1 and #2 sitting on the new series rack and since they looked like they needed a home, and the art looked fucking awesome, I decided to give BOOM! another shot.

I am so happy I did.

The first issue is gripping, well drawn, well colored, and damn-well written. This is going to be a big story among those of us who love mature content and superheroless comic books.

From Issue #2:
" You have a secret government widget that gives you the layout of the area?

I have Google Maps.

Is that a joke?

Of course not."

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