Where Are We?
I wasn't the biggest fan of this issue, to be completely honest. This is a pretty overdone trope, and bores me to death generally. And, while it makes sense why this is done and sets up for some interesting scenarios in the future, it sacrifices character work up until the end for a general experience that is too familiar to be overly effective.
What is nice, though, is that we're thrown into it just as our main characters are literally being thrown into the story in question. The students are left in something of a jungle environment and must survive. Seeing as they are given no info, they learn stuff just as we do, which, while a cliche, works to a degree.
However, there's no real focus for this issue, which throws the experience for a loop. Things just kind of happen, resulting in entirely reactionary storytelling rather than having a focal point or idea to follow when presenting the tale. There's no main character to follow, and, while some characters have more development than others, I don't feel like anyone stood out in particular, at least, until the end.
The environment also feels uninspired, but that's because I personally have seen it before previously in other readings. And, while somewhat faithful to the premise of the environment, I didn't notice any similarities or creatures that spanned both instances, which left me questioning how faithful this telling of the area in question is. And, while this is a good thing in keeping the place fresh for this story, it feels a little forced because of this as well.
There were a few two-page shots, which I'm honestly not the biggest fan of, but it captures some of the scenarios nicely, especially with the bigger creatures our heroes encounter. But these animals aren't anything terribly novel, to be honest, which turned me off of the story a little. There's also less humor here, I feel, as there's already so much exposition and ideas to cram in here that there isn't much time to enjoy what's going on.
We're left with some really interesting cliffhangers, but the experience is pretty standard at best, not capturing the characters or narrative well. It feels like a filler, but is necessary to the plot in some regards, and suffers because of this. I feel like there were better ways to tell this portion of our story, but this will do fine; just don't expect too much of it.