Face it: the internet is full of people posting their opinions about everything they read, watch, and experience. Critics these days are up against a lot of competition from well-informed, talented amateur opinion-slingers putting their thoughts on Goodreads, social media, comics sites, anywhere that offers them a platform. And then there are the endless professional review sites churning out their own takes on everything under the sun. You want to do a better job than they’re doing. Here are a few basic ways to make your criticism stand out, and to make sure you’re coming across as more organized, thoughtful, insightful, and professional than they are.
1) Start with a thesis.
An awful lot of online reviews are basically scattershot impressions with no throughline — just a list of plot points, thoughts on those plot points, and value judgments about a list of elements (which in a comics review might be the pencil work, lettering, coloring, etc., and in a film review might be cinematography, score, editing, etc.) These reviews read like lists, and it’s easy to lose interest in a list partway through. By contrast, really compelling reviews read a little like stories. They start with a thesis, a single overarching argument that is your primary statement about what your comic (or book or film or what have you) achieves or fails to achieve, or how it fits into the world. Some examples:
- “The first issue of this new series is so devoted to world-building, it forgets about the characters.”
- “The movie Logan reset expectations for what a Wolverine story should look like, and this story doesn’t live up to those expectations.”
- “Usually, superhero stories make people want to step into the heroes’ shoes. This one may make them fantasize about being the villain.”
- “X-Men stories have been struggling for a new metaphor for years now. Here, they finally find one.”
- “This entire series has been working toward this moment. It was worth the wait.”
Ideally, a thesis should carry through your entire review — once you’ve got your main idea, the rest of the review should aim toward proving your point, telling your story about how the thing you’re critiquing does or doesn’t meet its goals. Here are some ways to guarantee that.
2) Don’t overdo the plot summary.
It’s remarkably easy to fall into a pattern of reviewing solely by summarizing a thing’s plot, while adding running commentary. But that guarantees that your review isn’t going to be as interesting to someone who’s already read the comic / seen the movie / watched the show / etc. A really solid critique will help someone understand the thing you’re talking about even if they haven’t already experienced it, but it’ll also have some insight for people who have experienced it. And the best way to do that is to go light on explaining the plot, generally by limiting summary to a few significant sentences. You don’t need to go into close detail about every story beat.
3) Don’t rely too much on raw opinion.
All reviews are subjective, and they generally have some opinion in them. There’s nothing wrong with that. Critiques reflect your taste and your judgement. But they should reflect your knowledge and analysis as well. And they should be convincing, even to someone who doesn’t know you well. The best way to bring readers in on is to use facts to bolster your opinions. Give examples of what you’re talking about. Instead of saying “The dialogue is laughably bad,” say “The dialogue is full of clumsy lines like [quote].” Instead of saying “The book is full of clever transitions,” describe a couple of the transitions and consider what’s clever about them — how are they unusual? What can you communicate to convince a stranger that they’re clever?
4) When you are expressing opinion, give it some nuance.
Just as you should watch out for simple value judgments, watch out for simple, boring language and extremely common, overused words. Saying something is “good” or “bad,” that it’s “interesting” or “nice” or “fun” or “weak,” isn’t communicating much because these are bland and not particularly meaningful words. Avoid using “really” or “very” as intensifiers, because they’re so overused that people don’t generally see them — they’re visual tapioca. Use stronger language if the review merits it, and if you are describing something that’s so mild and inoffensive that it merits blah descriptors, explain why it’s so blah. (But also be careful about overusing unusual words, and don’t repeat a given unusual word more than once in a review.)
5) Don’t get too emotional.
There’s a place for strong emotion in reviews of exceptionally terrific or terrible things. Sometimes big emotions, even hyperbolic emotions, can make for funny, engaging reviews. (Remember the contemptuous, outraged New York Times review of Guy Fieri’s Times Square restaurant that was all over social media back in 2012?) They can be compelling if used sparingly. But if you’re demonstrably annoyed or gushy over too many reviews, you start to look performative and over-the-top. Generally speaking, a tone of objective, knowledgeable interest is more likely to engage readers.
6) Consider the context.
The simplest, most effective way to come across as a knowledgeable critic is to contextualize whatever you’re writing about. There are a wide variety of ways to do this, but it comes down to looking beyond the specific thing you’re reviewing, and considering how it fits among other things in its class. Do you know anything about the history of the franchise? About other works with these characters, by this writer, or in this vein? Can you compare its impact to the impact of past storylines that are similar in some way? Literally any context outside the individual title can be used to give readers a sense of a bigger picture, and give you more insight and a different angle on whatever you’re reviewing. Just as an example: if you’re writing about a Deadpool comic, it might be a good idea to consider how the written version of the character differs from the cinematic one who’s become the mainstream voice of the character. Or to talk about how other writers have handled him, and how the tone of the character changes, depending on who’s scripting. Or to talk about how his stories tend to follow familiar loops, and consider how this latest one fits or doesn’t fit the pattern. Anything that can give you a bigger picture than just the immediate story at hand.
7) Don’t tell your readers who they are or how they feel.
It’s weirdly common these days for clickbait listicles to have headlines that presume readers are ignorant (“27 Easter eggs that went over your head in Infinity War”), and for dashed-off reviews to presume that readers are going to react to something the exact same way the reviewer did. (“By the end of the story, you’re so impressed with the convoluted plotting that you’ve forgotten where the story started.”) Don’t do this. No one enjoys the presumption that they’re dumber or less in-touch or less capable than the writer they’re reading, and it may actively put people off from reading your work. And telling people how they will respond emotionally or intellectually to something is just asking for a knee-jerk “no I won’t” response. It’s best to just avoid using “you” in reviews and headlines altogether. Readers will react to a work in their own way; don’t assume you know what tastes or baggage they’re bringing to it, or that they’re exactly like you. Tell them what to expect, and they’ll decide for themselves how they feel about it.
8) Avoid condescension altogether.
Avoid words like “unquestionably” or “inarguably” or “of course,” which can come across as patronizing because you’re not just assuming the reader agrees with you, you’re telling them they do. Don’t use constructions like “As everyone knows,” or worse, “Unless you’ve been [under a rock, in a cave, living in the woods], you already know…” These can be alienating to people who don’t know whatever you’re about to talk about, while discounting and dismissing the knowledge of people who do already know it. (Those constructions are also a tremendous cliché.) Be extremely sparing with language that comes across as intellectually superior to whatever you’re reviewing, or gives the impression that you’re looking down on it from a lofty height — especially if it sounds like you’re dismissing an entire genre or franchise or what have you. Maybe you don’t like the Twilight books or the Divergent movies or fanfiction or whatever, and maybe you have good reason to. But coming across as dismissive or superior (“as everyone knows, the Twilight books are poorly written twaddle”) is never a good look. It looks like you’re trying to reaffirm your intelligence by scoring points against something inferior, which is something intelligent people rarely need to do.
9) Write all you want, but don’t forget to edit.
You don’t have to write concisely, and a lot of us don’t. But after you’ve written a review, going back and finding more efficient ways to say the same thing is the key to brevity. There are a lot of simple shortcuts to writing concisely, but it generally comes down to avoiding repetition, excess verbiage, and indirect, flowery language. Look for words that can be cut without losing meaning. Those meaningless intensifiers, like “really” and “very,” are prime suspects. So are passive-voice constructions like “the cult’s chalice is stolen by Betty” instead of “Betty steals the cult’s chalice.” Avoid the “finds himself” construction, as in “he finds himself fighting his arch-nemesis” instead of “he fights his arch-nemesis.” Look for opportunities to break down long sentences into shorter, more direct thoughts. It’s surprising how often the words “just” or “that” can be cut from sentences. The more concisely and directly you express yourself, the more impact your thoughts will have.
10) Have a conclusion.
If you started with a thesis, reaching a conclusion should be easy. Your last line should be a parallel or bookend to your opening, a reaffirmation of what you just said, or how you proved it, or why it’s true. Too many reviews just peter out after that list of thoughts. Think of the first line of a review as opening the door on an idea, and the last line as definitively closing that door.
-Tasha Robinson