Low #1 (Image)

CREDIT: Image Comics

Rating: 4.5/5 – Series Like This Are Why I Read Comics.
by ComicSpectrum EiC Bob Bretall.

Remender & Tocchini hit my radar as a team with Radical’s “Last Days of American Crime” in 2009-2010.  If you’ve never read that, I cannot recommend it highly enough, but other than it’s level of quality it’s about as far removed from this sci-fi/fantasy epic-in-the-making as you can get.  Set in the distant future, humanity has been driven to live at the bottom of the ocean by an expanding sun that has made the surface of the Earth an unlivable environment.

Remender does a great job of introducing the Caine family and the first half of the issue is devoted to setting the stage of the world the story is set in and getting to know the key players.  What could have been dry and clinical is made enthralling by Greg Tocchini’s art and the page layouts and panel compositions he chose to illustrate Remender’s story, complemented by his choice of color palette.  Without giving away the twist, the story kicks into high gear 2 page flips after the staple.  The leisurely pace and information-centric nature of the story to that point is flipped into action mode and our heroes get hit with a dilemma that will have to drive the story for many issues to come.

Low is very different from other stories Remender has told (as he describes in his “must read” text page at the end of the issue).  The combination of Remender’s world-building and story are combined with Tocchini’s art and made this issue thoroughly entertaining to me with the story standing out from every other comic that I’m reading.  That’s a really good thing, especially when you read as many comics as I do.  It’s visually and thematically unique and well worth checking out.  Getting to experience a series like this is why I read comics.

Reviewed by: Bob Bretall
(bob@comicspectrum.com)
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