Hi Everyone.

The sales figures came in, I ordered my review comics, and they arrived today, so let's start looking at them.

The lowest selling comic of October 2013(according to Comichron.com) was A1 #5, from Titan Comics.

As usual, I'm not familiar with the series, and didn't do any research into it before reading this issue, just to see if it's new reader friendly. There may be small spoilers, but I'llblockthem just in case. Let's start with the cover.

Cover:

I should mention that this is an anthology comic featuring 3 separate stories, and there is a cover available for each one. This cover is the Carpe Diem cover, and is the one that I got. It's quite nicely drawn and coloured, and represents the Carpe Diem story pretty well. I like that it mentions the other stories too, as with 3 covers available, it seems like they could easily have dedicated the whole thing to a particular story, but mentioning the others does make it clear that it's an anthology.

Art:

In Weirding Willows, the art by Barnaby Bagenda, is kind of sketchy, but not too bad to look at. It works O.K. with the fantasy style of the story. The colours used by Ifansyah Noor and Y2Laud work with the art in but are a little odd looking in places, looking a bit smudged in some places, and too blocky in others.

The art in

Carpe Diem by Rhoald Marcellius, has a sort of cartoony way to it, but still with the main kind of look of a comic book. It's exaggerated designs capture the spirit of the slightly humourous way the story seems to be going for, and the characters are all very distinctive. The colours by Sakti Yuwono fit the art pretty well.

As for Odyssey, drawn by Garrie M. Gastonny, it's more the sort of thing you'd expect to see in a comic book. It's nicely drawn, and the colours, again by Sakti Yuwono look quite natural. It seems like the kind of art that could be seen in a comic from a bigger publisher. I don't know for sure if the main character is supposed to be like a Captain America copy, but if that's what they were going for, I think they did a pretty good job, as to me, it does look like an alternate universe version, or even the kind of thing he could wear in the 616 universe.

Story/Writing:

In Weirding Willows by David Elliott, the characters from The Wind In The Willows, all with human names for some reason, hear a gunshot and go to investigate, only to find that a dinosaur called Rozalind has been shot by a farmer. This greatly annoys Frankensteins' Monster, as he knew Rozalinds grandmother, so Alice Liddel gets revenge on the farmer by taking magic mushrooms that make her grow, and puts him on top of a tree. The animals apparently were able to hear the gunshot and come to investigate it, because they have magic glowing crystals. The issue ends with a scene of Mowgli discovering that his cellmate is a werewolf called Kamaria. She hasn't been restrained, and it's a full moon...

Carpe Diem by W.H. Rauf, begins with a koala called Jude finding the new Monday of a group of people named after the days of the week, dead in some kind of submarine hangar. It turns out he's a mole in their organisation, and was actually a pirate. The team assembles to go after some pirates, who they believe have captured their boss, Sir 8th Day. It turns out he's really being held by Sansama, and the team goes to fight his hordes. Some of Sansamas people sacrifice Sir 8th Day to a volcano, and a giant fiery beast rises from it.

In Odyssey, also by David Elliot, Blazing Glory is attending an Occupy Wall Street protest in order to protect innocent protesters. A man who works with the riot police, possibly a policeman or government agent called Patrick(or Sharky, who is apparently the son of a god), Hulks up in front of him, and they begin to fight. He sends the riot police into the crowd, as they appear to be after one person in particuar, or possibly his child.

I felt kind of lost with these stories, the first one in particular. There wasn't much I could pick up about the characters or previous stories in general, so I don;t think this is a very good jumping on point for the series. Perhaps because of them being 10 page stories there isn't as much chance to put in hints for new readers, so maybe these stories are the sort of thing that are best read from the start.

Other Things Worth Mentioning:

30 Pages of comic content for $3.99, which is pretty good.

All the advertising is left to the end, so there's none to interrupt the stories.

I think the 3 covers are available in equal numbers, so you can just choose whichever you prefer.

I can't figure out why it's called A1

Overall:

Overall I feel kind of indifferent about this issue. I didn't really like or dislike it, and it had good and bad points. I think the fact that I didn't feel this works having not read other issues lowers it's score a bit, so I think I'd have to give it a 2/5, but a high 2(which is like 6/15 to me). I feel like other people might like this more than I did, especially with prior reading.

So has anyone on here read this issue? What did you think of it?

By the way, I have 2 more October comics to review that weren't quite the lowest seller, and their reviews should be up some time in the next couple of weeks. :)

Scarlotte.