50-Word (comic) Review: Art Ops #1- Dead art illustrates book where art comes alive

Writer: Shaun Simon
Artist: Mike Allred
Publisher: Vertigo/DC
Released: 28th October 2015



Art portraits are real, the subject lives within the frame, can be stolen, protected by ‘Art-Ops.’ The Mona Lisa is a physical lady, not oil on canvas. Creative idea from Shaun Simon, but I dislike the art. Comic book about art being alive has unimpressive art, ends up defeating itself?


Rating: 5/10

I really enjoyed ‘Neverboy’ from Shaun Simon. It had a great central idea, and the art (By Tyler Jenkins) was perfect for what the book was trying to convey. It was a book about creativity, and the art was very creative, so it was the perfect marriage between narrative and art. ‘Art-Ops’ features another creative concept from writer Shaun Simon, with the idea being that art is alive within the frame, and that what is drawn can come out of the frame and interact with the physical world. The ‘Art-Ops’ (who they work for, or how they are funded, is not specified) work to protect the people living in the portraits (how does it work with things like mountains and landscape portraits?) from art thieves. Are the art thieves purely interested in money, or is something more interesting going on? I’m not sure, but I’m sure we’ll find out later as I am unsure about any of the motivations here. The main protagonists are a punk haired boy (makes a change from a punk haired girl I guess, but what is it with the punk haircuts in comic books?) and his Mum. His Mum worked for the art-ops, but goes missing, and it’s up to him to take her place, but he’s reluctant, as is to be expected. He has no Dad by the way, which is a theme that I’m really starting to notice now in all forms of mainstream cultural programming. If you’ve read anything on my blog you’ll know what I think about that, and how the state wants fathers out of the lives of children, leaving children easy pray for the father substitute that is the state. I hope that the father turns up in this book, and I hope that he’s a good guy, as that will make a nice change from the norm and will be sending out a strong message about the importance of fathers, but we’ll see. The main problem I had with this book however was that I disliked Mike Allred’s art. I found it to be borderline bad, lacking in detail, lacking in intensity, lacking in emotion, blocky, static, amateurish, basic, and just not very good at all. What more can I say? I didn't like it, at all. That’s a huge disappointment to me because I really enjoyed the art in Neverboy, and the art here (for me) is nowhere near as good. I wanted to be impressed by this book, but the art just isn’t doing it for me, and I don’t know if there’s enough here plot/character/idea wise for me to hang around for too long. Because of the good-will I still retain from my enjoyment of Neverboy I’ll give it one more issue before making up my mind about it, but sad as it is for me to type out these words, I’m feeling very much underwhelmed by this book at the moment.

Comic review: Neverboy #6- A call for experience, individuality, creativity, renewal and life.

Writer: Shaun Simon
Artist: Tyler Jenkins
Colours: Kelly Fitzpatrick
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Released: 5th August 2015



This concluding issue of Neverboy poses essential questions regarding the drained pool of creative inspiration that is currently stifling the comic book world and leading to a period of comic book stagnation, dominated by corporate, careerist ignorance and a refusal to deal with the vital socio-political issues of our times.

Old heroes, done to death, the well runs dry.

Comic books are stuck. Not because they are an antiquated, anachronistic form of old media desperately trying to cling on to relevance in this wonderful new digital age, but stuck because they refuse to reflect the age in which they currently inhabit.

That is my view, and I recognise that it’s not held by the majority of comic book readers in 2015. This is reflected in sales figures and the popularity of depressingly awful movies like the childishly bad set piece, pun and quip-a-thon, Avengers Ultron.

It appears that the majority wants unreality, silliness, the cool factor, explosions, quips, puns, one-liners, old references and tight uniforms. But just because the majority wants to put their collective brains in a jar and watch the Gladitorial games of our times, whilst the world around them burns, that doesn’t mean that I have to go along with them.

If something is stupid, then I’ll say that it is stupid, and I couldn’t care less if that makes me an unpopular social outcast. Telling the truth isn’t supposed to be easy. It never was in the past, so why would that be any different today?

I used to buy lots of comic books, but it’s getting less and less now as the weeks and month’s pass. I used to buy over ten books a week. This week I purchased three. This saddens me immensely, as I’ve always loved comic books, and I want to buy lots of them, but if all they are going to do is bread and circus, that no longer appeals to me.

I’m 42 years old now, and I cannot act like a child anymore.

My problem is that I’m a bit of a reality junkie. I pay attention to the world. I see what is going on, and it interests me. But then I pick up a comic book, and what do I see? I see the 1990’s being replayed, and it doesn’t interest me. I see nostalgia, and I see a love of government authority, mixed with race, gender and sexuality politics, attempting to put a new gloss onto what is a very old, tired and childish superhero toybox.

It’s not just a superhero problem though. I collect issue #1’s. Not because I think that they will be worth something in the future, but because I hope that they will be good, I read them, they suck, and I don’t buy issue #2. Hang on, I’ll just pop into my wardrobe and bring out my folder of issue #1’s.

The following is a random list of these #1’s and an explanation of what they were about:

1- 68 Bad Sign #1- 1960’s US serial killer and zombies.
2- Beyond Belief #1- 1950’s upper class detectives. Cute, charming and very anachronistic.
3- Savior #1- Plane crash and superpowers (like that old Bruce Willis movie).
4- Fight Club 2 #1- Weighed down by the 1999 movie, and doing nothing new.
5- Constantine- The Hellblazer #1- More 90’s reworking.
6- Weirdworld #1- Conan the Barbarian, but weirdly whiny and soft.
7- Doomed #1- Spiderman with slightly different powers and a smartphone.
8- The Tomorrows #1- Identity politics, Blade Runner and old art school references.
9- The Shrinking Man #1- Comic book adaptation of a 1950’s novel.
10- John Flood #1- Constantine clone who looks like Edward Cullen.

Now, here’s a quotation from Neverboy #6:

The imagination of a child, creating something new.

‘You’ve been using other people’s imaginations, and it’s destroying it for everyone. Paint something real- Something real to you, not to anyone else. Something that only you can see.’

Neverboy is a call for originality, individuality and genuine artistic creativity. It’s asking you to put down your isurveilance device, to put down your old comic books, and to experience something genuinely new. It’s asking you to go out into the world, to look around you, to experience life, then go back to the computer, back to the easel, and create something NEW, something that genuinely comes from within YOU. It is a call to the imagination of a child, of the new-born creative mind, unencumbered by the weighty backlog of what has come before.

It’s 2015, and the world has changed in so many ways since the 1990’s. Writers and artists need to tap into what is happening now, forget the past, and reflect what is happening in the world today.

A revolution is needed, and no, I’m not talking about a revolution based on Internet identity politics and university approved cultural Marxism. Social media arguments about race, gender and sexuality are not going to cut it. If comic books are going to start to reflect the real world then writers and artists will need to experience some of that real world, and that doesn’t mean arguing with a politically correct social justice warrior (or a right-winger) on twitter. Perhaps we all need to switch off, live a little, and then come back to this comic book thing again?

Be wacky, be weird, just do something new.

Neverboy has been a fantastic comic book, bursting with creativity, originality and vital, urgent philosophic questioning about the nature of artistic inspiration, about the wellspring of imagination, and what happens when the well begins to dry up and people continue to take, take, take without putting anything back. The art itself has been great, a celebration of life, not life indoors on the computer, or life with headphones on, but real scent life, vivid, colourful, beautiful, exhilarating, a bit weird, a bit wacky, but exciting, essential, exhilarating human life.

This wonderfully, genuinely creative title has concluded it’s short run with a message about doing something new that comes from within, not from the past, or a fake computer life. It’s a message that we all need to take onboard, myself included, and as I finish off this review/rant I take that message into myself.

I need to stop typing, stop complaining, stop twittering, stop reading, and to go out into the big old, beautiful colourful world, to find inspiration, to energise, create, reflect and live my life as it is supposed to be lived.

That’s quite a revelation, and one I took from this beautiful, rare gem of a comic book. I’m going to miss this one, but the message of life, experience, renewal, creativity and individuality that it contains will linger for a long time yet.


Rating: 10/10 (An intellectually engaging, fun, wacky and creatively inspired comic book)

Comic review: Neverboy #3- Transcendent

Story: Shaun Simon
Art: Tyler Jenkins
Colours: Kelly Fitzpatrick
Cover art: Conor Nolan
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Released: 6th May 2015


There are two full-page panels* of beautiful artwork in Neverboy #3, and after you experience them it’s quite easy to forget that you’ve just been reading a beautifully complex, subtle, intelligent and emotionally engaging comic book narrative as well.

Neverboy #3 has a feel of philosophy about it, that feeling of concepts that you can almost touch, but try as you might they always seem tantalising near, yet just out of reach. I really do enjoy the book. It’s one of those books that I read over and over again.

I take my time with it because I know it’s good, and I want to understand why it’s good. I want to deconstruct it, like you are supposed to do if you are a proper comic book reviewer, or even if you are just a bloke reviewing a comic book for his Internet blog.

I like how the story lets you make your own mind up about it, that’s probably the key. I like how it lays itself open. It’s not telling you what to think. It just wants you to engage, in your own way, to make of it what you like. That’s rare in comic books, a book that invites contemplation, doesn’t preach and doesn’t tell you what is right, what is wrong, what is real, what is fantasy.

It’s a floaty book with floaty art, and I love it. It’s arty, but good arty, if you know what I mean. There’s no snobbishness to it. It’s just plain and simple good.

There are two moments that stand-out to me about issue #3, the first is the moment when the artist character reveals his painting, the masterpiece that shows he is back on form, full of new inspiration and ready to go. That’s a difficult thing to do as the painting is shown in a full-page panel, and it has to be good, really good, to work within the narrative.

You can’t talk about a writer regaining his creative muse and then show a blah example of his work that is supposed to be great, can you? What you need is something that is actually really very good, and guess what? That’s what they have here in this book, a full page painting of a diner with two space alien type creatures emerging from it’s Dr Who Tardis like front door, and it looks absolutely superb. I want it framed. I want it on my wall. I want to spend money on it and enjoy it every single time I walk into my living room.

The second moment is when a group of women talk about their life motivations. They openly admit that they live for material concerns, for shopping, for a house, a car, the status, the shoes, the plastic surgery. It’s all empty physicality, appearance, that idea that we are animals, that you get what you can because death lasts forever, and there is no heaven.

That Satanic (and that’s what real Satanism actually is, the belief in nothing but the animal self) is the dominant mind-set of our age. To see it expressed here by a group of pretty young rich ladies seems awfully real, and it’s the contrast with the mind-set of the artist, of the fantasy dreamer that puts a sharp edge to that awful contrast that is a real as real gets. 

Neverboy is fantasy, but fantasy on the edge of brutal reality, and to see the juxtaposition between the fakery of flesh, ego, materialism and status, and that which comes from the pure joy of the creative process is quite a jolt. It forces you into the realisation that there is a truth transcendent from the material status of the self, and that happiness does not come from a thing, it comes from within.

Neverboy #3 then continues the excellence exhibited in the first two issues of the title. I’ve attempted to get to the core of why it works here, but I really cannot do it justice with words alone. Buy the book, read it slowly, enjoy it, then do it all over again.


Rating: 10/10 (Transcendent)

* The first panel is in the main narrative of the text and is by main artist Tyler Jenkins. The second full-page panel of beautiful artwork comes after the conclusion of the story and is by Taylan Kurtulus.

Comic Review: Neverboy #2- There’s something magical about this one

Writer: Shaun Simon
Artist: Tyler Jenkins
Colours: Kelly Fitzpatrick
Cover: Conor Nolan
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Released: 1st April 2015


The first issue of Neverboy was such a joy, bringing forth a new idea into the comic book sphere, and doing it so very well. But so often in the comic book world a good start flatters to deceive and that one initial idea is pretty much all that the comic has to offer. Bearing all of that in mind, let’s get the following question answered as quickly as possible:

Is Neverboy #2 any good?

In short, it’s excellent. It brings new elements into the narrative and is just as exciting, enjoyable and creative as that tremendous opening. Did I ever have any doubts that this second issue wouldn’t be as good as the first? Not really, strange though that may seem, I just knew that this one would be good before I even read it.

Something is going on with the writing here, as it’s absolutely inspired. The main protagonist of the story doesn’t even make an appearance until the half-way point of the book, with the first half spent introducing a down on his luck, out of work and out of inspiration artist. It’s quite ironic really as writer Shaun Simon has introduced his complete opposite here, an artist running out of ideas, when he himself is very apparently overflowing with them.

The technique of introducing this character (and even featuring him on the front cover) works so well, and there is a gentle, slow, pondering sadness to the pacing in this first half that creates an impression of going nowhere, of having stopped. As the book reaches the half-way point it absolutely explodes with life as the manic, drug hunting, trying to cling to this reality, yet bristling with energy and inspiration Neverboy arrives on the scene, injecting new life into the suicidal artist.

There’s something special happening here, and it’s difficult to fully describe it. Like a really good magic show this book is just something that you have to experience for yourself. A review can attempt to capture what is going on, but you need to experience it yourself to fully appreciate and understand the context and subtle texture of the experience.

I’m not sure if other reviewers have mentioned this before, but the writing here reminds me of Neil Gaiman, when he was young, when he was new, and when he was bristling with energy and creativity that leapt of the pages of those early Sandman comic books. And just like those books, it’s the art being in perfect synch with the writing that really kicks Neverboy into another level. 

There’s a connection between writer and artist here. They understand what their world is all about, they both get it, and their vision is combining quite beautifully to create a book about art, about creativity, about inspiration that is overflowing with all of these qualities itself. 

Neverboy is a portal, much like Sandman. Something hugely exciting is beginning here. It’s overflowing with that elusive, much sought after, yet rarely found element of new life that is birthed within superior works of creative art. It’s rare, very rare, and I run the risk of going overboard here, but there’s something magical about this one.


Rating: 10/10 (Absolutely superb second issue, with so much promise for what is still to come)

Comic book review: Neverboy #1- Avoid the previews, just buy the book

Writer: Shaun Simon
Artist: Tyler Jenkins
Colourist: Kelly Fitzpatrick
Cover Artist: Conor Nolan
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
Released: 4th March 2015


Don’t read the previews for this book, as they spoil the central idea that makes it so much fun, and worth purchasing in the first place.

Neverboy #1 has an idea, that idea is new, and you don’t get much that is really new in comics these days. You’ll have to trust me on this one, as I’m not going to say much about the book during this review. Just take my word for it that Neverboy #1 is a bloody good comic, take a chance, buy it, and I’m pretty sure that you’ll both like it, and thank me for warning you about the previews.

I can understand why the central idea was leaked to the preview writers. It’s a great idea, and knowing about that idea tempted me into purchasing the book in the first place, not the writer or artist, it was that one idea, and when you have a great idea why not tell everybody about it?

The worst thing surely would be to have a great idea, keep it secret, then have nobody buying your book, so by releasing the idea at least you get people’s attention. I understand that perfectly, so this review is for those fortunate people out there who haven’t yet read any previews.

JUST BUY THE BOOK.

That’s all you need to know.

Neverboy #1 made me smile, made me happy, made me feel good about the comic book genre as a whole and reminded me that all it takes is one idea, and everything feels brand new again.

Rating: 10/10