First Knife

If you're familiar with Simon Roy (Habitat; Prophet), you know that he excels at creating lush, lived in worlds that are both immediately familiar and oddly alien, whether he's on art duties, writing duties, or both. Here he's joined by a wealth of creators including Daniel Bensen (co-writer), Artyom Trakhanov (illustrator), Jason Wordie (colorist), and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (letterer) for a simple story of a young woman and her blood-drinking robot-god-lover in a far-off post-apocalyptic North America full of alien terraforming techno-gods and warring tribal nations. What's not to love?!The world-building is effortless and expansive, the illustration is kinetic and tactile, the colors are vibrant and at times vicious, and the lettering is evocative, inventive, and fun. I hope the team can come back for more stories in the world of the 33rd Century Southern Hudsoni Territories and beyond.

The art was amazing, and I loved the world building.But the actual story wasn't really for me.It has a lot of love put into it, that is very clear.

The Hudsoni have supposedly been building longhouses in Chicago and claimed it was "theirs" but when they went there, they had to sneak in and attack like an invading force? Not very clear what the relationship is, there. They either control the area or they don't. He said they do, but then they snuck in and out like bandits. Not the behavior of a controlling, occupying force - if that even is was the situations is supposed to be - you see, this entire story lacks any sort of situational clarity. On their pilgrimage to the temple, their group is supposedly made up of people from both groups (Hudsoni and the "Chicago slaves" or whatever they're supposed to be) but they are impossible to tell apart - and further complicating things is not knowing what the "deal" was between the groups, so you don't really have a grasp of why they hate each other so much (see first sentence). It all amounts to a feeling that this story and these characters are leaving me behind to go play out the events on their own - they don't seem to care whether or not I'm able to follow along. It's hard enough when the character models change from panel to panel so you have to backtrack, find a matching outfit, and then connect the two drawings in your mind as being the same character, even though their face looks completely different each time it appears. So when they turn on each other and start in-fighting, you literally have no way of knowing who is on what side and who wants what. The action sequences are equally unintelligible. A fragment of a foot here, a twisted energy beam there (which direction is this beam supposed to be going? Is it the deva getting hit by a beam in this panel, or is the deva shooting the beam out?) - it all amounts to a perceived lack of empathy for the reader. The creators and editors have their minds too far up their own ideas and have failed to step back and try to READ it - because this is not a well-cartooned book. Lovely drawings as they stand apart from each other, but they do not work together to create logical sequences that a reader can follow along with. Great illustration work, bad comics work.

As an old geek, I miss captions boxes in comics. I really do. True, there were many times during the ’60s and even more so in the ‘70s when they got way out of hand and made me go, “Geez, I might as well be reading a BOOK,” lol, but used judiciously and in the proper way—providing information that enhances and elaborates on the visuals rather than reiterating them—they can be a wonderful addition to the comic-reading experience. But if you’re building a future world as First Knife does, involving mankind’s decline from advanced technology to Old World religion and native culture, and you DON’T have caption boxes or character explanations or documentary artifacts cluing you in on what the heck happened in the past, then guess what? A reader like yours truly can get a little lost, or frustrated at the lack of basic information that would add more depth to everything and increase the storytelling moments and possibilities. True, there are very detailed text pieces at the end of each issue that look straight from a museum exhibit—which, as it turns out, was the story’s fictional conceit before it evolved into a comic—but they’re just interesting or semi-interesting filler; a lot of which, I think, could have simply and easily been incorporated into the actual story. But, hey, I really ordered the book for the art. However, while Artyom Trakhonov is one of the most unique artists out there, comparable with Alex Nino for his wildly organic expressionism, his layouts, like Nino’s, can be damn hard to follow, which only compounded my difficulty at figuring out what was going on. I’m reminded of Kamandi, where Kirby was told to do a Planet of the Apes takeoff and just ran with it, creating a post-disaster world where every issue exploded with wild new characters and discoveries that didn’t confuse you for a minute, or if they did you didn’t care because the stories were just so fun and engaging and well-told. First Knife, unfortunately, as well thought out as its history was on paper, is no Kamandi.

Aspettavo con impazienza questo libro e l'attesa ne è valsa la pena; avevo già letto il "primo capitolo" durante la prima quarantena, quand'era stato reso disponibile gratis su comixology. Ad avermi catturato erano stati gli scorci di un mondo post apocalittico, con popolazione cresciute sui resti della cultura umana. Non mi vengono in mente altri fumetti con cui paragonarlo se non Nausicaa della valle del vento, seppur FIRST KNIFE sia più incentrato sull'azione che su temi ambientali o spirituali. Il world building è incredibile, i particolari vengono delineati mano a mano senza mai dare spiegoni al lettore. I personaggi sono tutti interessanti, adoro il modo in cui ARTYOM TRAKHANOV(il disegnatore) rende le espressioni dei personaggi, non me l'ho aspettavo. Parlando dei disegni lo stile di TRAKHANOV sembra propendere più verso il grafico e difficilmente è difficile capire cosa accade, avviene solo nella scena più concitate e d'azione in cui i protagonisti sono i personaggi "meno organici". Il volume riesce a concludere le diverse trame ma spero che si possa in futuro scoprire di più su questo incredibile e pulsante mondo, magari seguendo le altre tribù/clan che vengono presentate a fine volume.

Great story with satisfying conclusion and there's fun notes on development too

誰かがみた夢の話をきいているような、沢山ある自分の関心事を一つの世界にぎゅうぎゅうに詰め込んだ、鮮やかな話。話の最後に残るのは夢の持ち主の核心。(題材の詰め込み過ぎに、漫画と違いフルカラーなことも加勢して読者を世界に引き入れてはくれない。それが悪いとは思わないが。)絵は版画のような独特のタッチで初めて読む分には複雑。特にアクションシーンや素早い動きのあるシーンは何が起きているのか分からない。だが、読み進めて絵に慣れてくると、従来の絵とは違った楽しみ方ができる。説明し辛いが、足が動いてジャンプして…といった脳の言語処理のエリアを使わずに見たままを記号的に楽しめるようになると凄く感情豊かな絵だと思えた。直に心に訴えかけてくる絵。1-5号の表紙も収録されている。5号の表紙が特に良くて(可愛い)、枠に収まる世界というのがやはりどこか個人的な夢の話に感じさせた。(大陸の広範囲におよぶ時代を超えた話であるのに、収まりを感じる…自分の世界で生きる純粋な子供の夢世界)2020年の初めにカナダのコミックストアでPROTECTORを手に取り、2020年の終わりにFIRST KNIFEを日本のamazonから受け取った。色んな意味で忘れられない作品になった。少なくともこの作品を最後まで読めただけ良かった。Thank you.