Wednesday, October 12, 2016

Book Review: Sin Titulo

Sin Titulo Sin Titulo by Cameron Stewart
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Sin Titulo is quoted - lauded - by many critics as a surrealist masterpiece. Call me a killjoy, but I think there's a fine line between "surreal" and "I have no idea what's going on anymore." There's simply too much happening too quickly, and too many things that don't connect, leading to an ending that isn't very satisfying. You're left with the constant feel that the story is constricted and was capable of being more than it wound up being, and nothing pains me more than reading someone who clearly has talent rush themselves.

At first, I was ready to excuse some of Sin Titulo's rushed feel due to it being a single graphic novel, and now restrictive such a format can be to work with. However, learning this was initially a webcomic, meaning the author had all the time and pages in the world to create the original story, destroys that excuse and makes me knock another star off this book's total.

Book Review: Transformers Volume 1: More Than Meets the Eye

Transformers Volume 1: More Than Meets the Eye Transformers Volume 1: More Than Meets the Eye by Nick Roche
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

MTMTE volume 1 introduces some fun characters, but also has a lot of problems with its writing. The first chapter doesn't do a very good job catching up people new to the IDW Transformers universe and seems confused about what readers need to know (I think referencing what issue most of the stuff mentioned in the first three pages would have been more helpful than telling us where one off-hand comment Drift made that doesn't really impact the story originates from, thanks.) The other problem is the dialog all feels rather generic and self-righteous; all the characters speak in a similarly long winded, humorous style and I can't give each character a unique voice while reading. The writer seems more interested in showing off their wit than crafting a unique cast through dialog, and thus most of the interesting traits of each character are told instead of shown.

The story is just good enough to keep my interest (and admittedly even if it wasn't I bought the Humble Bundle with most of the series in it and refuse not to read books I spent good money on) but I'm not particularly impressed.