Will Isola Continue After Issue 9
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This was a decent read but the story moves pretty slow and there are a lot of chunks of it that have little to no dialogue which I'm not generally a big fan of. One the other hand the art is absolutely gorgeous so you do have some excellent panels to look at in the meantime. Also it's been awhile since I read the first one so it took me a second to remember what was going on but that's more on me lol. I will probably end up reading the next one when it comes out though, overall
actual rating: 3.5This was a decent read but the story moves pretty slow and there are a lot of chunks of it that have little to no dialogue which I'm not generally a big fan of. One the other hand the art is absolutely gorgeous so you do have some excellent panels to look at in the meantime. Also it's been awhile since I read the first one so it took me a second to remember what was going on but that's more on me lol. I will probably end up reading the next one when it comes out though, overall it's interesting and pretty but kind of sparse in places with the story.
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Isola, Vol. 1: 4 / 5
The plot is a little slow moving here which I don't really mind but I didn't feel quite the same excitement or sense of novelty I had with the first volume.
In this instalment Olwyn and Rook are still wandering and trying to find Isola. On the way they stubble through a community where all children have disappeared. They suspect the Moro but it seems there is little Olwyn and Rook can do to help them.
Through some visions and spells secrets are revealed and the appear
☆ 4 / 5 ☆Isola, Vol. 1: 4 / 5
The plot is a little slow moving here which I don't really mind but I didn't feel quite the same excitement or sense of novelty I had with the first volume.
In this instalment Olwyn and Rook are still wandering and trying to find Isola. On the way they stubble through a community where all children have disappeared. They suspect the Moro but it seems there is little Olwyn and Rook can do to help them.
Through some visions and spells secrets are revealed and the appearances of other players might shift. At the end of this volume it would seem like the dynamic between our main two characters will shift.
I think that in this instalment we see a more protective side of Olwyn while Volume 1 was more about Rook protecting her, and I really enjoyed that. Allusions to both of their pasts are dropped here and there but I truly can't wait for their backstories to get a little more substance.
I was thinking this with Volume 1 too but Rook always has the best random side characters helping her. I'm absolutely in love with them all and I wish they'd circle back into the story down the line.
The art of this series is stunning and I'll definitely come back to it once we have another volume, I'm very intrigued to see where this will go, with what might seem to be higher magical powers being involved and the potential brewing war with Palagrine Rock.
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Per comixology, the most recent issue of the comic single issue of Isola is Feb 202o. Over a year ago! Fletcher, Herschl and Msassyk: Let's get the move on! Need more of this.
On my buy, borrow, skip scale: Definitely a buy. You'll want to thumb through the art again and again.
More stunning art from Karl Herschl and colorist Msassyk. The more interesting and complex story in this collection makes this volume superior to Vol. 1.
Per comixology, the most recent issue of the comic single issue of Isola is Feb 202o. Over a year ago! Fletcher, Herschl and Msassyk: Let's get the move on! Need more of this.
On my buy, borrow, skip scale: Definitely a buy. You'll want to thumb through the art again and again.
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There are plot points and ideas that I would usually love. The spiderish godghostspiritthing that inhabits the girl who looks like the queen, the tigerqueen rescuing a group of children who'd been forced into the shape of other animals, the skeptical mother. Great ideas, poorly executed.
I hope this book eventually gets to a point where it lives up to its potential, and to its art, but I wish these first two volumes were entirely rewritten because it is uninspiring.
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Total review score: 3.65
Individual issue reviews: #6 | #7 | #8 | #9 | #10Total review score: 3.65
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Plot: 3/5
Characters & development: 3/5
Setting & worldbuilding: 4/5
Once again a great volume. The only thing holding it back for me is the lack of emotional connection to the characters. I love estoric storytelling, I love a good mystery, I love piecing things together. Isola has all that in spades; the problem for me is that I find it hard to get invested in the plot because I know so little about these characters, especially Rook. I find it very difficult to care about her journey when
Art: 5/5Plot: 3/5
Characters & development: 3/5
Setting & worldbuilding: 4/5
Once again a great volume. The only thing holding it back for me is the lack of emotional connection to the characters. I love estoric storytelling, I love a good mystery, I love piecing things together. Isola has all that in spades; the problem for me is that I find it hard to get invested in the plot because I know so little about these characters, especially Rook. I find it very difficult to care about her journey when I know so little about her, and have otherwise been shown a fairly one dimensional character so far. By contrast, the Queen's character development has been stellar, and is proof that the creators have the chops to create a vague yet compelling character. Hoping Rook gets more love next volume: it would give the story a much stronger emotional connection and give the reader a proper anchor for a deliberately foggy plot.
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With that we made very little progress in getting closer to Isola itself but the side quest that is covered in this volume I quite enjoyed. I found the events of this edition were a little b
It appears that this series is going for vibes and colors over substance, and you know what? I am totally fine with that. I love looking at these, I love the mystical atmosphere and I love the big role that animals play, and how there often seems to be a link between humans and animals in some shape or form.With that we made very little progress in getting closer to Isola itself but the side quest that is covered in this volume I quite enjoyed. I found the events of this edition were a little bit easier to follow, a bit less confusing. It probably helped that this one was no longer burdened with the duty of laying out the background of the plot, the last one had to do all the introductory things while also trying to tell its own tale, this one could just rush straight into it and go for a ride. So this one benefits from being No 2.
Not sure when/ if Vol. 3 will see the light of day but I'd read it. I love how gorgeous these are and how they give me a quick animal laden adventure tale, this one has some stunning panels and gets quite creepy in moments. The romance between Olwyn and Rook is quite charming for it is lowkey and can even win me as a non-romance reader over. The ending here was very solid and managed to tie the story of chapter 2 into the bigger picture.
For me: fantastic, quick and beautiful escapist reads, and yes, I take another chapter, please.
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I hope that Isola returns with a volume 3, there's still so much left in the journey for Rook and Olwyn, but knowing Fletcher's spent the past year battling covid after-affects I don't know if Isola is going to return anytime soon.
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As with before, the book chronicles a deserter military captain and her young queen, since transformed into a black tiger, who together traverse a clever and unique river of fantasy literature. Rook is an admirable fool, throwing herself into anything and everything for the sake of repaying a debt that was never tru
Beautiful, cryptic and almost entirely nonsensical, ISOLA #2 is a comic book that bleeds chaos and discontent without any true grasp of how it got to where it is or where it's going.As with before, the book chronicles a deserter military captain and her young queen, since transformed into a black tiger, who together traverse a clever and unique river of fantasy literature. Rook is an admirable fool, throwing herself into anything and everything for the sake of repaying a debt that was never truly hers. And while Olwyn, the tiger, is only moderately interesting, the need for Rook to play off the animal character begets one or two interesting soliloquies readers rarely encounter in contemporary comics.
ISOLA #2 lacks focus. And in many cases, lacks the context or inciting action that would provide readers with any reason to feel invested in whatever the creative team purports to be the comic's focus. The history of violence and betrayal in the royal family is still horribly muddled. And yet, Olwyn has repeated visions as if in support of a version of the truth the readers have yet to see? It's a complicated draw of the cards and a waste of energy. A flesh-dealing bone witch feuds with a specter of the night? It's clever worldbuilding without any real value to a character-based narrative.
Readers will be hard-pressed to articulate how or why these events come into play, much less explain their resolution. Fantasy storytelling is known for inventing the boundaries of its reality, but here one encounters a tale whose genre fixations are an excuse to manifest a whirlwind of uncertainty simply because it looks, feels, or sounds eclectic. Random, gigantic birds of death. Multi-limbed shapeshifters. ISOLA #2 traffics in the inexplicable.
The art is strong, expressive, and ever on-point. The ferocious contrast between the sun-scalded orange clay of desert valleys and the cool blue evenings on the edge of decaying farmland push readers from one lush palette into another. The comic's composition is particularly strong. For example, as Rook and Olwyn descend a spiral staircase to a valley floor, readers encounter a single, horizontal panel atop the page, before drifting into a sequence of vertical panels, each expressing the scale and precarity of the characters' descent with greater and greater acuity.
If not for the unconventional and by extension unintelligible story, ISOLA #2 might have proven an interesting stretch beyond the limits of what contemporary fantasy comics have to offer. It's too bad none of it makes any sense.
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I had hoped that the second volume would fix the issues i had with the first but unfortunately i still could not fall in love with the characters or get into the story. I really thought i would like this comic based on the art style and the summary, however i found that almost every issue i was missing information, I wish there was a prologue to give a better idea on how the characters got to where the
Similar to the first volume I loved the art style however i couldn't really get into the story.I had hoped that the second volume would fix the issues i had with the first but unfortunately i still could not fall in love with the characters or get into the story. I really thought i would like this comic based on the art style and the summary, however i found that almost every issue i was missing information, I wish there was a prologue to give a better idea on how the characters got to where they are.
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The story has flashbacks and dream sequences and magical elements, so I did need to re-read some pages to understand what was happening. Re-read volume 1, too, which was helpful.
The most beautiful art of any graphic novel I've read, and a satisfyingly moving and complex story.The story has flashbacks and dream sequences and magical elements, so I did need to re-read some pages to understand what was happening. Re-read volume 1, too, which was helpful.
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Captain Rook and Queen Olwyn, still bound in her tiger form, continue their journey towards Isola in this second arc. The story is slow and disappointingly low on character development, but Kerschl and Msassyk more than make up for that with their Eisner nominated art.
This volume has more of a horror vibe as we meet a spider-like spirit after Olwyn, a village with missing children, and a
Isola's second volume isn't my favorite book of the year so far, but it very well might be the most gorgeous.Captain Rook and Queen Olwyn, still bound in her tiger form, continue their journey towards Isola in this second arc. The story is slow and disappointingly low on character development, but Kerschl and Msassyk more than make up for that with their Eisner nominated art.
This volume has more of a horror vibe as we meet a spider-like spirit after Olwyn, a village with missing children, and a witch who entrances Rook. Fans of horror, Studio Ghibli films, as well as the darker elements of Avatar: The Last Airbender and Saga will find a lot to enjoy here. (And wimps like me will still enjoy it too.)
The art team goes all in with saturated colors – from canyon oranges to spooky blues and purples – and compelling character designs. They also use white lines (which I referred to as "chicken scratch" in my notes) and alien symbols to show sound effects, an interesting detail that heightens the fantasy feeling of Isola. And I don't know if Kerschl has been watching Aladdin on repeat, but the way he gives Olwyn so much expression as a tiger is fantastic.
If only Fletcher was also all-in on the story – and if Rook had as much personality as her tiger companion – Isola would be a home run. It's hard to be invested in Rook when all we know is her loyalty to Olwyn, and once again, that she grew up on a farm. *SPOILERS* When the witch seduces Rook, we could have gotten a window into her past, which may have created some emotional payoff in the big secret Rook learns this arc: that Olwyn's mother ordered her own mother's death, and Olwyn knew about it the whole time. Instead, that revelation falls flat for the reader, and a lot of time is spent on a villain character who doesn't make it out of the volume, instead of our protagonist.
Rook doesn't yet feel fully realized to me, and while I love the gender reversals and the visuals of Isola's world, it's hard to stay invested when the characters remain half in shadow.
There are also still a lot of unresolved questions in this volume, as Fletcher continues to hint at the wider political intrigue, Olwyn (and her mother) and Rook's pasts, and Hallum, a terrifying hawk creature. This is often a staple of fantasy world building, and how much this bothers a reader depends on how much payoff is worth (potentially a few years of) patience and unanswered questions.
Personally, I'm on the fence. The world building questions wouldn't matter as much if I felt more invested in Rook. But tiger Olwyn and the art could be enough to get me through one more arc.
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Between this and volume 1, I think it's safe to say that Isola is intended to be a slow-burning series where things are revealed gradually, and always with some of the very best art I've seen in comics in recent years. Shout out to MSASSYK for the incredible colouring work, the whole thing glows.
Rook, a soldier on the run, and Olwyn, her queen transformed into a blue tiger, are still traversing their world to find Isola, the place where perha
2022 Read A Graphic Novel Every Week Challenge - 10/52Between this and volume 1, I think it's safe to say that Isola is intended to be a slow-burning series where things are revealed gradually, and always with some of the very best art I've seen in comics in recent years. Shout out to MSASSYK for the incredible colouring work, the whole thing glows.
Rook, a soldier on the run, and Olwyn, her queen transformed into a blue tiger, are still traversing their world to find Isola, the place where perhaps Olwyn can be turned back into a human and avert war. The world is being revealed to us in snapshots, and it's a good thing I like slow-burning comics with great art or this might be starting to drag a little.
There was also one section which I found a bit confusing on first read, although a second read through managed to unlock what happened (I think). Always a risk with high fantasy but it didn't detract from my enjoyment overall.
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Some facial/body expressions of the characters are remarkable, and give a truly natural feeling to the story.
Awesome world building, with language/expressions, creatures, environments and mythology of its own.
I'm still curious about the heading of the story but I'm starting to worry if the authors are going to deliver in the end.
Almost two years have now passed since issue #10...
Let's hope for the best, for the story, the characters and the readers.
An
Gorgeous art but a slowly developing story...Some facial/body expressions of the characters are remarkable, and give a truly natural feeling to the story.
Awesome world building, with language/expressions, creatures, environments and mythology of its own.
I'm still curious about the heading of the story but I'm starting to worry if the authors are going to deliver in the end.
Almost two years have now passed since issue #10...
Let's hope for the best, for the story, the characters and the readers.
Anyway, go ahead and give it a shot: this could well be one of the most beautiful and skillfully drawn graphic novel of the last decade.
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Tip: Recommended graphic novels with similar visual styles:
- "The Wormworld Saga" by Daniel Lieske
- the "Love" series, by Frédéric Brrémaud & Federico Bertolucci
This volume felt like a detour or side quest from the main plot, but we do see the war forces making way. The side quest actually reminded me of the Witcher comics.
My favorite characters in this volume were Janny the cook and the child who trusted Rook.
Once again, I could feel the rain at the beginning. The
3.5 or 4 stars. The storytelling is better than in vol. 1. What also helped was that Rook understands the Queen as a tiger now and talks to other people. I liked hearing more from the world.This volume felt like a detour or side quest from the main plot, but we do see the war forces making way. The side quest actually reminded me of the Witcher comics.
My favorite characters in this volume were Janny the cook and the child who trusted Rook.
Once again, I could feel the rain at the beginning. The art is beautiful and does a great job at mood.
I had read vol 2 digitally, but I want to buy a physical copy now because I enjoyed the experience in vol 2 better than vol 1. I'll read vol 3.
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I get a faint sense of some of it being made up as they go along - I'm not sure there's a fully defined end in mind - but I'll be along for the rest of the ride regardless. I started reading this series because of Karl Kerschl's art, which remains beautiful. But I appreciated the subtle touch of Fletcher's narrative more in the second volume. Nothing is explicit, but much can be understood with attention.
I get a faint sense of some of it being made up as they go along - I'm not sure there's a fully defined end in mind - but I'll be along for the rest of the ride regardless. ...more
This is a review of issues 6 to 9 only. The series moves along slowly with Rook and Olwyn constantly on the move and meeting a few characters, some welcoming, some more threatening along the way. It's beautifully produced but I'd like a bit more progression. Excellent and occasionally unclear artwork makes this worth a look.
much much better with a united and fluid storyline.
The art work is absolutely phenomenal with the use of color to provide a sense of emotion.
Kerchl's art really is the star of this series and why I keep coming back for more. The first volume was berry choppy and was a bit hard to follow when it came to the story. This volume is
much much better with a united and fluid storyline.
The art work is absolutely phenomenal with the use of color to provide a sense of emotion.
Kerchl's art really is the star of this series and why I keep coming back for more. ...more
He contributed the acclaimed Flash story to the Eisner and Harvey Award winning Wednesday Comics and has recently launched a Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Pink series for Boom! Studios.
Brenden Fletcher is a writer who's worked on DC Comics titles including the bestselling Batgirl of Burnside, Gotham Academy, and Black Canary.He contributed the acclaimed Flash story to the Eisner and Harvey Award winning Wednesday Comics and has recently launched a Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Pink series for Boom! Studios.
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