Alex Groff
Feb 21, 2004, 12:03 pm
<a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/ind/demo4.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/ind/demo4t.jpg" align=left alt="INDIE SPOTLIGHT: DEMO #4 REVIEW"></a>Reviewer: Alex groff, al_groff@yahoo.com
Quick Rating: Excellent
Story Title: Stand Strong
Proof of what DEMO can be.
Story: Brian Wood
Art: Becky Cloonan
Letters: Ryan Yount
Published by: Larry Young and Mimi Rosenheim, AiT/Planet Lar
As Brian puts it in his afterword, "When you're [eighteen] and you don't have the money for college, not a lot of options exist for you. You can easily get locked into boring routines, bad patterns, ****ty jobs, family obligations and stagnant relationships.... This is neither good nor bad. It's just a reality. For those locked into it, you can either let it drag you down and turn you into someone you don't want to be, or you can be proud of that reality as something that defines who you truly are, and stand strong."
That's really all you need to know about Demo #4. Like #2, the story a solid character study that makes you care about people you will never see again. It becomes increasingly obvious with each issue that any comparison to X-Men fails, because this isn't a book about mutant powers, though they do exist. This is a book about the serious decisions people have to make: decisions that could define, or redefine, their lives. This is a book that about people, with characters more fully developed in 24 pages than many characters are 24 issues. I've had problems with some of the previous issues, and now you see why. #1 and #3 were both good, but Demo #4 is the perfect example of what Brian Wood can do when he hits the mark. When he hits the mark, there's no comparison.
This book, much like Scott Morse's Batman: Roomful of Strangers, felt like it should have been squarebound, so I could stick it on my shelf and give it the dignity it deserves. The characterizations are spot on, and the story builds to a fine crescendo, and an even finer closure. Wood tells the story of Jimmy, a factory worker who is trapped between his friends' dreams of a better life and his family's belief in hard work and dignity. Jimmy has a tough decision to make-- and, honestly, neither decision is the perfect decision; there is no Cinderella ending. There is simply the right choice, the noble choice. This situation gives the story both a sense of realism and a sense of satisfaction, a rare combination in any story.
Cloonan's art, as usual, shows a few kinks while remaining otherwise solid. Now to be honest, the more of Becky Cloonan's work that I read, the more I realize that she and I simply have very different tastes in art. If I could afford to hang a painting on my wall, it would be a Campay. If I had to pick my favorite comics artist, it would be a toss up between Sienkiewicz and McKean. Which is to say that my disagreements with Cloonan's art are, at least partially, a matter of taste—and, for that, I apologize.
In Demo #4, Cloonan uses Soviet propaganda art as her model, and it works quite well. The first and last pages are beautiful, and the "superpower" effect—which looks like scratches on a negative—works wonderfully. The blocky style fits both Jimmy's power and the industrial style of the story. However—in a strange twist—it's Cloonan's characters that start to confuse me. Jimmy and one of the unnamed characters are almost interchangeable, and Jimmy's proportions seem to change in different places. This is unusual—because Cloonan normally excels with characters—but in spite of these details the book remains fairly solid.
In the end, Brian Wood's afterward says it all, and really this review is just icing on the cake. Demo #4 is an action story: not because it has gunshots and explosions, but because it lets actions tell the story of our lives, because it shows how those actions affect our lives.
ART
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitnone.jpg
STORY
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OVERALL
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aithalf.jpg
Quick Rating: Excellent
Story Title: Stand Strong
Proof of what DEMO can be.
Story: Brian Wood
Art: Becky Cloonan
Letters: Ryan Yount
Published by: Larry Young and Mimi Rosenheim, AiT/Planet Lar
As Brian puts it in his afterword, "When you're [eighteen] and you don't have the money for college, not a lot of options exist for you. You can easily get locked into boring routines, bad patterns, ****ty jobs, family obligations and stagnant relationships.... This is neither good nor bad. It's just a reality. For those locked into it, you can either let it drag you down and turn you into someone you don't want to be, or you can be proud of that reality as something that defines who you truly are, and stand strong."
That's really all you need to know about Demo #4. Like #2, the story a solid character study that makes you care about people you will never see again. It becomes increasingly obvious with each issue that any comparison to X-Men fails, because this isn't a book about mutant powers, though they do exist. This is a book about the serious decisions people have to make: decisions that could define, or redefine, their lives. This is a book that about people, with characters more fully developed in 24 pages than many characters are 24 issues. I've had problems with some of the previous issues, and now you see why. #1 and #3 were both good, but Demo #4 is the perfect example of what Brian Wood can do when he hits the mark. When he hits the mark, there's no comparison.
This book, much like Scott Morse's Batman: Roomful of Strangers, felt like it should have been squarebound, so I could stick it on my shelf and give it the dignity it deserves. The characterizations are spot on, and the story builds to a fine crescendo, and an even finer closure. Wood tells the story of Jimmy, a factory worker who is trapped between his friends' dreams of a better life and his family's belief in hard work and dignity. Jimmy has a tough decision to make-- and, honestly, neither decision is the perfect decision; there is no Cinderella ending. There is simply the right choice, the noble choice. This situation gives the story both a sense of realism and a sense of satisfaction, a rare combination in any story.
Cloonan's art, as usual, shows a few kinks while remaining otherwise solid. Now to be honest, the more of Becky Cloonan's work that I read, the more I realize that she and I simply have very different tastes in art. If I could afford to hang a painting on my wall, it would be a Campay. If I had to pick my favorite comics artist, it would be a toss up between Sienkiewicz and McKean. Which is to say that my disagreements with Cloonan's art are, at least partially, a matter of taste—and, for that, I apologize.
In Demo #4, Cloonan uses Soviet propaganda art as her model, and it works quite well. The first and last pages are beautiful, and the "superpower" effect—which looks like scratches on a negative—works wonderfully. The blocky style fits both Jimmy's power and the industrial style of the story. However—in a strange twist—it's Cloonan's characters that start to confuse me. Jimmy and one of the unnamed characters are almost interchangeable, and Jimmy's proportions seem to change in different places. This is unusual—because Cloonan normally excels with characters—but in spite of these details the book remains fairly solid.
In the end, Brian Wood's afterward says it all, and really this review is just icing on the cake. Demo #4 is an action story: not because it has gunshots and explosions, but because it lets actions tell the story of our lives, because it shows how those actions affect our lives.
ART
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitnone.jpg
STORY
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg
OVERALL
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aitfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/aithalf.jpg