Terran Sandz

Art: The explosions are excellent - appropriate amounts of debris and mayhem. I've never paid much attention to line work before, but the line weights in this comic add so much complexity and energy to the characters and environment - I had to take notice! It's extremely impressive and inspirational in my own art. The poses are dynamic and well-planned. Characers are in proportion with great muscle-toning. (Well, I guess I'm making an assumption here on proportion since they really aren't human...) The layout of the pages adds interest and pulls the reader through the page with style. Easy to follow and read - great use of "white space." One of my favorite panels had a silohuette of TerranSandz pulling out a piece of shrapnel - made me cringe (which means it was effective)!

Writing: Compelling storyline, excellent inner monologues - believable ways of speaking. It's action-packed and suspenseful with a bit of humor thrown in to keep it light. Different characters have different "accents" which is fun - also makes it easier to tell characters apart when they're speaking off-panel. My particular favorite was Legiil's manner of speech - he's so clinical and matter-of-fact when he talks about others, but he's so deliciously delusional when he's talking about himself. I like the Spiderman-esque way of TS discovering his new powers - he's a bit awkward and unsure but is always delighted when he finds a new trick (instead of taking them for granted or automatically knowing everything he's capable of doing). There are many loose threads, but I'm assuming those will be covered as time goes by.

Some additional thoughts:
The mechanical font was a bit hard to read.
I thought some of the fights went on a wee bit too long, but then I'm a very impatient person =]

Overall, I'm extremely impressed with the art and storytelling. I'll definitely be checking out the other books by cs3ink!

Terran Sandz is loaded with a great deal of flavor that truly makes it stand out as a real sci-fi drama with a dash of light humor to guide you through the bumps and bruises...

Heh - LITERALLY!

-You have your tragic and tortured hero.
-Over-zealous minions with oddly matched dialogue ("Dude", "I'm so gonna...", "It's like...you know")

And best of all...
-The stuck-on-himself god, Legiil

Art & Layout - 4.5/5
Here's a word that fits - the artwork is STELLAR! A oft-halftoned, white-grey-black colored body of work with tremedous detail in the pencils and inks. The shading and definition of the galaxy-esque landscapes are simply terrific. The persepctives easily give the reader the satisfaction that they're also along for the star-hopping journey from planet to planet - even if some of them do explode. Without question, those have to be my favorite scenes.

The battle scenes are in some panels fairly epic and in other scenes abbreviated to work around the lead character's staccatoed soliloquies and antagonistic banter with armored foes. I'm especially impressed by the comic's mythology, which is defined in characters like Legiil's reptilian-like cosmetics and squinty demeanor.

Terran Sandz has a great design too and it seems, more tenacity with each step and punch he takes in every fight scene.

Writing - 4/5
Terran Sandz spends a great deal of his time in his staccatoed speech repeating himself - especially when he's just talking to himself. That plays very well here because he's adjusting to what seem to be, changes to his anatomy - the running gag about him having hair is funny. He's also adjusting to the present circumstances of his situation and new powers added to his body structure - unfortunately, the praises is more directed at Legiil's pride for creating Terran. Thoughts of where he came from, the death of his people, plus dealing with Legiil who seem to taunt and praise him at the same time. Given that there is a connecting comic that goes with Terran Sandz, I'm sure there's much more to the mythology than what can be read in these pages. All that aside, the writing is quick and fun to read. The bulk of which is spent dialoguing between fight scenes, yet still represents quite well for this type of action comic. Your artistic use of onomatopoeia and font choices really add slick style to an epic story with a classic comic appeal.

Overall - 4/5
Terran Sandz plays the hero and seems to let his anger fuel him for the next challenge, even when he seems like he's down for the count. You're left to wonder what kind of odds he really does have against the person who created him as he is presently in battle against him. Still, the art and layouts work nicely with the writing like a well-orchestrated ballet. This comic is definitely one for your favs folder.

The art:

The art fits the pulp-sci-fi style of the comic. The color splash page with the heavily inked black and white interior pages works really well. The alien design on the scenery is VERY pulp, and for me thats a good thing, although I could see how others might be a little turned off by it. There is occasional hiccups with the anatomy, usually during some of the more dramatic angles in the fight scenes, but this is really a extremely minor gripe in an otherwise fantastic looking comic. Also some of the more exaggeraded facial expressions on the main character sometimes feel out of place against the high level of detail in the design. Almost like his facial muscle structure wouldn't result in such a facial expression. Again these are very minor gripes, and if I wasn't specifically looking for them I probably wouldn't've noticed anything. Absolutely professional, and ready for print.

The writing

The comic is action oriented, and I think one of the things this really does well is keep the story interesting throughout the action scenes. It's easy for action scenes to be boring when they're not integrated into the actual story, but Terra Sandz never has that problem. The biggest issue I have with the story so far is that Terra Sandz hasn't had a moment to stop and breathe. I sorta get the sensation of "what the hell is going on? why is any of this happening?" From a storytelling prespective, I don't really think, at the moment, that this detracts from the comic at all, because I get the feeling that the reader will be caught up with the who's and why's at the appropriate time. It reads through really quickly because of the fast pace, and really, I'm looking forward to reading more. Although because of the "comic book" format I couldn't see myself coming back once or twice a week for a single page, I'd have to pop by every couple of months to read a full issue at a time. One of the weakest elements is the dialogue. Not to say that it's bad, but that it could use some work. One of the biggest issues I have here is in the human slang used by many all of the characters, including the non-human ones. It noticably pulled me out of the comic. Thinking "how does this alien know about hotdogs?" Or "why is 'crap' even part of his vocabulary. It doesn't look like he even has an anus." I don't know if it was a conscious decision to inculde specifically earth-human slang words... are we going to find out later that this is somehow related to earth...like the distant future or something...even then, will they still be saying "crap" in the distant future, probably they'll have some other slang word for it.

All and all this is a solid comic and a fun read, except for a few minor gripes, there is very little I would suggest to improve upon.

Just more please :)

Art: lovely lovely LOVELY tone work! Love it. I think it suits the story and the setting *applauds* (heavy blacks work really well too). Love the action scenes. Nicely done! Page layouts are interesting and engaging as well. everything seems to be in place (well....there are so small anatomy issues but that's just gonna fix itself as you progress :) )

Writing: I liked it. It was fast paced, not too wordy, straight to the point. I think I liked the most the fact that it's not burdensome at all. I breezed through it and made me interested enough to want to see more. Good job. Keep it up. :)

Thank you all for such great reviews. I appreciate the effort put into each one.

Later,
Chip