Who hasn’t woken up from a night of crazy partying, with all the abilities needed to fight an alien monster?  Your Major Spoilers review of Retroverse #1 from Comixology Originals, awaits!

RETROVERSE #1

Writer: Cullen Bunn
Artist: John Bivens
Letterer: Anna Peterson
Publisher: Comixology Originals
Cover Price: $2.99
Release Date: December 14th, 2022

Previously in Retroverse: Kacy is a high school student with a boyfriend T.J., a best friend Krissy and a less than stellar home life.  But if she’s going to survive much longer, she will have to convince everyone she exists.

HECK OF A HANGOVER

Retroverse #1 opens with Kacy standing between a group of teenagers and a monster.  She assures them that she can hold it off, but she isn’t sure why she thinks that.  Things then go back to the day before.  It shows that Kace is just a normal high school student who goes to a party.  There she drinks heavily and passes out.  The next morning she wakes up and is unsure of where she is.  As she starts to recognize her surroundings she realizes that no one recognizes her.  As she makes her way to her school and tries to engage with her friends, the monster appears, bringing the story back to the present.

JUST SORT OF UNINTERESTING

Stop me if you’ve heard this one “A protagonist wakes up, with mysterious abilities, and before they can figure things out, a threat appears and the protagonist sort of wings it and comes out on top.”  As far as I could tell, the only thing that really felt unique about Retroverse #1  was that it wasn’t the protagonist who had complete amnesia, but it was everyone else.  Even then though, it doesn’t feel well executed and just played out as people awkwardly staring at each other.  It’s not all bad though.  The way that the jumps in time are handled isn’t disorienting at all and does actually serve the plot and isn’t just an unnecessary quirk.  Also, as opposed to a lot of depictions of high schoolers, the ones here don’t feel cheesy or cliche.  There seems to be a legitimate reason that the main character is a teenager other than simply appealing to a specific audience.

JUMBLED AND UNCLEAR

For an issue that introduces the reader to the story with a fight scene, and then wraps up with a fight scene, you’d hope that these would be the strongest moments visually.  Unfortunately, that’s not the case.  The flow of the action is stilted and there isn’t much in terms of a sense of motion.  It’s not clear how one panel moves into the next, giving this the look of a photo album of the fight.

BOTTOM LINE:  A WEAK OPENING

Retroverse #1 does nothing new, nor does it feel like it even tries.  While the characters are fine and the pacing is decent, the plot feels cliched and lacks any decent hooks to make a reader want to come back for more. The only reason I could see to seek this one out is if you’re reading it for free with a Comixology Unlimited account.  2 out of 5 Stars

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Retroverse #1

40%

40%

Uninspired

Retroverse #1 just doesn’t do enough things right to make it something worth checking out. The plot has little in terms of uniqueness and the art doesn’t do much to help bring the story to life.

• Writing

  4
• Art

  4
• Coloring

  4
• User Ratings (0 Votes)
  0