Faust

Overcome with obsession, Dr. Faust agrees to sell his soul to the devil. Is he truly bound for hell, or is there hope for him yet?

Faust

Historia von D. Johann Fausten created in 1587. This is what is considered to be the original Faust story. What most people know of Faust is the story by Marlowe. The story is simple; a man sells his soul to the devil in order to obtain knowledge. Normally I find the story of Faust very boring, borderline retarded to be honest. The sole reason that Faust has for selling his soul is for knowledge. Perhaps I am being a little to judgmental but that has always been a hurdle for me that I haven’t been able to overcome. Fortunately Korosa has changed that.
A lost love is a tragic thing to put into a story. Tragic in its inherent sadness and tragic in the simple fact that, that, particularly plot point has been done to death. Funny then that in a retelling of a story that is over four hundred years old the “lost love” plot can be so effective. It is with simple idea that Korosa completely changes the story.
It is an interesting thing watching a man destroy himself. This is essentiality what Faust does. However Korosa manages to give Faust a very basic and very human reason to do so. Guilt. Instead of having Faust seek knowledge for a purely selfish reason, we see a Faust that seeks knowledge out of guilt, despair, and self-loathing. This makes the character utterly more fascinating. Something Marlowe never did for me.
However fascinated I am though by Faust, I am equally uninterested in his main/assistant Claire. More personal taste than anything, but I think by having Claire play such a large role in the story it draws attention away from Faust. More to the point it just doesn’t feel like Faust has made the story his own yet, because so much time has been given to Claire. Of course as much as I don’t like Claire I do like what she brings to the story. In Marlowe’s Faust the character seem to be very solitary; but by giving Faust an assistant, and one who seems to have a crush/love for Faust, not only does it open up more possibilities as far as story goes, it also allows Faust to interact with others. A very simple thing but powerful none the less. How Korosa will use this remains to be seen. I can only hope it is something more than a simple romance.
As far as the other characters they have had little to no screen time so not to much can be said about them. I will mention that what little we have seen of Mephistopheles has been very interesting.
I am not going to mention the art, I like it and I can’t draw, so I am not going to critique it.
Simple and interesting. Two words that I have used a couple of times in this review and for good reason. Korosa has taken a simple story and made it interesting. Faust has some unique factor, some indiscernible trait, that make is riveting. If you looking for action go elsewhere, if however, you are looking for a story that can and will sink its hooks into you look no further.

Faust is a story completely run on a emotional level. The comic is full of conflict and drama! Although the basis of the story is simple, it is driven on the emotions of the characters, and as such becomes complex and interesting in the process, particularly to those looking for something driven by drama.

Artwise there is very little to complain about! The art style is clean and clear. The pacing and layouts and brilliant. They help move things along steadily, and angles/layouts are used to their full potential, bringing out the emotion in each page. During the beginning of the comic, the text is a little hard to follow in places, but this improves quickly as the comic moves along, so dont be fooled!

Story-wise, this is certainly a character driven story, and there is a good focus on the characters. Claire, the main character, takes most of this focus. This is nice though, as I feel readers will get to know her at the beginning, before the story delves into her realtionship with Faust. Faust, himself, seems at the beginning to be a pretty typical self indulgent character. There is ALOT of attention on him, and yet we do not get to know him as we do Claire, which can make him feel a little 2 dimensional (like someone made purely for fan girls to go 'aaaaww!' to). Still, as the comic furthers, that focus draws onto him, and Faust becomes just as real as Claire.

Faust is in a lot of respects very professionally done. The pacing, art work and story are all in the grand scheme of things done on a extremely professional level. As such, the criticisms I will give are ones on a more professional level, and ones that to be honest will not have to mean much or be important to a normal web comic reader, or someone who is just looking to be entertained.

The artwork is wonderful in many ways. clear, clean and easy on the eye. But, this to me does make it slightly boring. I have not seen one character in Faust yet that isnt young and pretty looking. Like in a good deal of comics, Faust has beautiful art, but is only beautiful and nothing else. There is alot of focus on the characters, so to give them more variety in looks and age would give Faust a great advantage.
The story, also a nit picking critism, is almost completely focused on the one relationship between the two main characters. There is a lot there, a lot of conflict and drama, it is great entertainment! But, it is obvious there are some lovely underlying themes that will come through...unfortunately I feel they will be lost with so much emphasis on that one realtionship.

as I said before, these critisisms are little things that I would not normally focus on, and are not that important to be honest!

Overall, this comic is a great read, and at a very professional level for a web comic! The artwork and pacing is clear and emotional. The story is completely focused on characters, drama and emotion. If you want something entertaining and enjoyable, and like your stories full of conflict and drama, you'll love this!

Opening: This comic gives off a great first impression. Readers will first identify with the high quality of art and the subtle use of color that portrays the overall tone of the comic. The story stands on its own as an engaging story that borrows from a traditional story. A very well mixed and blended comic.

The Big Picture: You can not help but notice the art in this comic. The very well balanced touch of traditional American drawing and Japanese style manga is very refreshing. The story is very well written. I’m not usually fond of retakes on traditional stories, but I have no real connection with the story of Faust so I found myself turning page after page. The use of space is very impressive, some pages use images rather than dialogue and the story still dictates just fine. The story never stalls and the dialogue emphasizes character development well. Webcomics always have the challenge of portraying action and movement in a non-moving platform and this comic is a great example of action done well on paper. Despite it being a dramatic comic, the few instances of action or movement are portrayed in a very strong way. From a sudden hand grab to a character’s body language, all of it is drawn very well.

The Small Picture: I’d like to dive a bit into the art, since it has in my opinion done what many webcomic creators such as myself struggle with, that is to make the reader forget that he is reading not just a webcomic, but a story. When art is done well in a webcomic, readers won’t notice the small mistakes or the weird angles or awkward perspectives. Readers dive into the world created before them and they fully invest what they see before them. I think most of us artists struggle with that, and our readers often can pick out the amateur side of our art. This comic brought me in and I almost felt like I was watching an animation. The lines are clean and elegant and play really well with the subtle colors. The use of grayish brown as a tone brings out the depth of the story and places it in its time period. The hint of cartoonish features and manga style hair is whimsical and really helped bring me into the mysterious and mystical storylines. Ms. Sellers has done an excellent job bridging a traditional tale with her own story. I will say that the blurb or disclaimer at the beginning of the series does give off a sense of dread even before you dive into the story. I would recommend the blurb be made smaller or shorter, or eliminated all together. Another suggestion I might put up would be to not be afraid of showing the ugliness of things. The entire comic feels like a very pleasant dream, and I think a little look into how to bring out the shocking or ugliness of a story like this would benefit the overall tone. The traditional story itself is already quite disturbing and creepy, and I would’ve liked to see more investment into that. Of course this is only a suggestion if Ms. Sellers sees it fit well into the story.

Conclusion: A very aesthetic webcomic that is one to give the rest of us motivation to give that much more attention in our own art and storytelling. A great example of how a webcomic can hold onto a readers attention and bring them into a world that they’ve created.

OVERALL

I think this is a great read. With comics I start reading the first couple of ballons and if I am not grabbed I start skimming and then I just start looking at the pictures. Faust kept my attention. I really wanted to keep reading.

The art was clean and clear. No confusion there.

Story

Interesting, I want to know what's going on. I don't know the faust story, though the review above did sum it up for me. Seems like there is potential to me.

Writing

As I said above, it really held my attention. I thought the writing was to the point. Not too much talking. Not a fan of a lot of talking. And for a comic that deals more with emotion and circumstance, not action, the writer did an excellent job of not talking too much.

Art

The art does what it needs to do to tell the story. I did think the doctor looked quite young, but i dont mind the beautiful people. The grey scale coloring works well for the comic I think. It makes it a little more pleasing to the eye then if it was just completely line art. its not totally grey, it has like a sepia quality to it. I think the art is better for the more recent pages then the older pages.

Well, here goes.

Background
The story thus far follows Dr. Faust in his grieving over his dead wife. Some of it is viewed through the eyes of his assistant(?) Claire, a character absent from the Marlowe or Goethe versions of the story. While the Faust of the older stories is a man driven by selfish desires for knowledge, this Faust is driven more by guilt over what he perceives as his personal failings, specifically a failure to his wife. This drives him over the edge to selling his soul to the devil.

Overall Impression
All in all, I would have to say that I enjoyed the comic. It has a generally likable feel to it and coupled with as interesting a story as that of Dr. Faust makes for a good read. There may be a few things that aren't as top-notch as the rest of the comic, but in general, it is enjoyable enough to overlook these inconsistencies.

Story 3.5/5
If you're familiar with the original story of Dr. Faust, there won't be anything really new as far as the general flow of the story goes. What the comic does add to the classic is a new angle, a new lens upon which to view the story through. This has it's good points, and some bad points however.

(+) The Good
The story reads very well. Although we generally know what's coming, it doesn't hinder or hamper us from wanting to read further. Because it's not a repetition of the old stories, but rather a retelling, the story has new points of view to offer. The story, while familiar, is not boring and does not read as would something that we had read over and over with not change in the story.

(+) The Bad
Because the story is told not only from Faust's point of view, but also from Claire's, we are able to see the story from different and interesting points of view. This however, can slightly detracts from the feel of the comic. It is slightly more difficult to see how Faust suffers when it is told to us by a woman smitten with him.

In the same line, while Faust seems to come off as an intense person, it is difficult to see that in the story. Because Claire tells us how sad he is, and how hurt he is, it is difficult to actually see this in Faust. This detracts from the feel of the character and makes for a slightly less effective doctor.

Art 3.75/5
The art in the comic is fairly well done. The drawings are clean and crisp. The lettering is well done and does much (in the case of Mephistopheles) to convey how the characters are speaking. The art is consistent and conveys the emotions needed for each scene. If I have any complaints, it would be a bit on the coloring and shading of the characters. The pencils and the lineart is fine, but in some panels such is not enough to take the reader's eyes off of the other parts of the piece.

Slightly distracting would be the fuzzy shadow around text bubbles. Because of the soft feathering, it seems to clash with the rest of the comic's clean and crisp lines. This is more personal taste than anything, but it seems to be worth mentioning.

(+) The Good
The pencils shine here. The characters are consistently drawn and are each distinct enough to be easily recognizable to the reader. The manga style may not appeal to some, but it works well with the story. And to expound on that, any that refuse to read a comic just because it's done in a style other than what that individual is used to needs to learn to branch out into different fields. There's a wealth of great reading in every style out there. And this is an example of such.

(+) The Bad
I may have to gripe about some of the artwork though, as good as it is. One thing that has irked me with comic art is the texturing of cloth. A common practice is to past a texture over a cloth or any surface, without taking into consideration how the folds of the said cloth will affect and distort the texture.

Examples of these are as follows:

http://drunkduck.com/Faust/index.php?p=387664
http://drunkduck.com/Faust/index.php?p=391683

While seemingly minor, it can distract the reader from the otherwise superb drawings of the comic. Fortunately, this is not seen as often throughout the rest of the comic.

My final gripe with the artwork would have to be the predominance of "bishie" art, or the pretty-boys common in many manga or anime stories.

For example:

http://www.drunkduck.com/Faust/index.php?p=436335

This may be a turn-off for some readers, but is not too big of an issue. It does however, affect Faust at times. It's hard to see him as being driven by guilt or as being a brilliant doctor seeing as how he looks so young. Beyond that however, it doesn't affect the story too greatly.

Dialog 3.25/5
All in all, the way the characters write is done well enough. Each character speaks, to an extent, as one would expect that character to speak. Some notable exceptions however, would be Faust himself. Mephistopheles on the other hand, is written very nicely: the sinister tone, with just a hint of boredom sated only by sadistic deviations from his ennui.

(+) The Good
Mephistopheles. As stated above, the way he speaks is perfect. He draws out his speech at the right times, and jabs with a forked tongue when his target is at his weakest. He speaks very well, you can almost imagine his voice tempting and tormenting Faust.

For example (my favourite lines from the comic thus far)

http://www.drunkduck.com/Faust/index.php?p=463061

(+) The Bad
Faust doesn't shine nearly as much as Mephistopheles, but at least not as poorly as Claire. Don't get me wrong though. I'm not saying that Claire was written poorly, it's just that she wasn't written well enough. She seems to be a one-dimensional foil for Faust, a wall upon which the story plays out. She speaks with genuine feeling at times, but for some of the rest, she seems to more play out a stereotype. When she speaks well, she speaks fairly well; but when she doesn't, she doesn't.

Faust on the other hand, displays sudden mood swings that are difficult to attribute to events in the story. Take the following panels for instance:

http://www.drunkduck.com/Faust/index.php?p=452808

Here, his voice and his demeanor suggest chilling and almost insane determination. You can see it on his face. And his words, "Well... It sounds as though you already know what that is." seem to indicate his submission and his determination to seal the deal. This was well written. It shows a great transition from grieving, to a solidification of his determination. Very well written. The problem comes in the next page though:

http://www.drunkduck.com/Faust/index.php?p=455197

Here, he returns to being indecisive once again. It seems as if he suddenly lost all of that determination. It's evident in his face, as if he once again has no idea as to what is going on. He seemed to say that he was ready, that the devil knew what to give him and what he was going to pay. Faust then goes on some more agonizing over what it's worth to him. This sudden change detracts from the previous. It seems as if there was no reason for the change, and none is seemingly given.

In Conclusion 10.5/15 Read it!
To sum up, despite some flaws and inconsistencies, the comic is definitely worth reading. The story is captivating enough, and the art is most assuredly worth taking a look at. So, next time you have a chance, give this one a go.



BMR, signing off.

Overall 9.2/10

Faust, a story based on a simple legend, expands that legend with deep emotion and expert style. I myself haven't read the original/most popular versions of the legend, but I can tell from the very premise - a man sells his soul for knowledge - that it can be retooled and expanded on quite easily, and in this case has been done well.

Art and Design: The art is consistent and well-done. It's not without its flaws, but no flaw ever detracts from the story at hand or makes the art less admirable. The design of each page is also admirable, with subtle textures and an ever-present sepia hue that enhances the pages beyond simple black-and-white. The shading isn't cel (something I'm used to seeing lately) and is actually very well-done and solid.

There were a good many pages I enjoyed, one of which being this: http://www.drunkduck.com/Faust/?p=456771 in which I like everything, but especially the composition.

The design of characters makes each one distinct, and there are just enough pretty guys with interesting personalities to perk up your interests should they ever fade. I personally would have liked to see Mephisto be able to shift forms and be either more human (to relate to their sinful nature) or more reflective of his demonic self.

Typography: Everything is easily readable. That makes the comic itself easy to absorb and fast to read. I appreciate that so, so much. It's treated as a comic should be in this department.

Story and Writing: The story is very emotional - and I like it. I somehow feel Dr. Faust's suffering could be pushed to be more overt, so that the offering of his soul to Mephisto wouldn't seem almost too much, yet in recent pages it is made very clear how much he has suffered. To know he and Claire share some sort of emotion for each other is good, however; bitter as he is, at least he still has the capacity to care for someone, and that makes him different from a good many main characters in modern stories who have embittered themselves towards everything. Yet we find the main character on his path to damnation, a path I particularly enjoy reading.
So, the story isn't boring in the least. It captures you in the way that it should, makes you wish to know the mind of the man even more.

The writing is well-done enough. Each character is able to be recognized by their speech alone, so far. All of it flows well enough in conjunction with the typography. I would reserve any nitpicks until the story is further on, as it is still young, and I have the feeling that characters who currently only have potential (such as Claire) will shine soon enough. (Unlike what others have said, I feel the focus on Claire doesn't subtract from Faust at all, as he is also the focus of her concerns. I'm just as interest in both characters, though Faust a bit more, as it should be. This story is, after all, a lot more emotional than I expected (and I expect their legends would never have been like this), and you need a pair like them to even be able to tell a story like this.)

Also, there is no inane blather or excess of exposition, which is very easy to do in this kind of comic, so I respect it for that!


tl;dr This comic came out a little above my expectations, and that's good. :D It's very worth reading, especially if you like emotional stories, but even if you don't. You will identify with each character's struggle and be moved by their choices.

I read this comic not knowing anything really about the story by Marlowe and so I'm not one to really compare the two; but I thought this comic was done spectacularly.

The emotions the characters display through their expressions and dialogue is excellent. You really get the sense that Faust has gone mad with despair and guilt.
The art itself is very well done, there are a few panels here and there where things seem a little disproportionate but that happens to even the best artists and doesn't bother me so much.
What was a little annoying is that, besides the length of their hair, Margaret and Claire seem to have very similar appearances.
Margaret example
Claire example
At first I thought that the girl in the flashback was Claire with longer hair.

Other than that one thing I thought it was a great comic. I added it to my favorites and look forward to seeing more of it.

Sorry I haven't said this before, but THANK YOU to everyone that reviewed! It's really nice to get a detailed perspective of what other people think about the comic. You people are awesome.