Graphic Novel Reviews
by Jamie Coville

Against the Wall 1/4 Paradise Comicon Preview Edition Price: $3 Writer: Dino Caruso Artist: Shawn Richter Publisher: Caruso Comics Format: Black and White, 20 pages, roughly digest sized.

This is a black and white portion/preview of an original graphic novel. From the preview it appears to be about a guy that plays "wall ball" which is like baseball, but without the catcher. Instead they draw a square box on a wall behind the batter and that's the strike zone. We also learn the guy has an interest in making films and a female friend. The preview ends with an event to get you interested in the story. The scripting is okay, but not particularly exciting. There are some unneeded captions, like "his crew" over a group of people. Captions are used quite a bit as a short cut to introduce a variety of characters. Overall, I just found the story boring. The characters didn't really connect with me. The final hook at the end of the preview really comes out of left field and makes me think the book is really about something other than wall ball and a guy that plays it. I'm no longer certain what the story is supposed to be about. The art is very straight forward, perhaps a bit too much so. The wall ball scenes could have used more speedlines or something to make it more exciting. I guess overall I wish it was a bit more dynamic. The figures are good and details are used well. A few different perspectives are used but most of the panels are chest/shoulders and face shots. Silhouettes get used regularly. An overall problem was a mix of the art and the format. When doing comics in smaller/digest sized formats I think less panels should be used and less open space within the panels. It appears the art was intended for a regular sized comic and the smaller format worked against it. While this book is much better than other small press books I've reviewed it didn't do it's job of getting me interested in the full fledged GN. I give it 2 out of 5 stars. Regards, Jamie Coville http://www.TheGraphicNovels.com News and discussion on a free, Delphi like forum.

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