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sevenworlds's review against another edition
4.0
Too much happens in too short a period of time, so that you're not left with enough time to process what it all means. I wanted to know so much more about Destiny, more background info, more of what's in her head. There's honestly enough action here to power almost double the number of issues. There is a lot of violence (though it's not gory.)
That being said, the premise behind Genius is powerful and thrilling. The hero is an orphaned, teenaged black girl from South Central who has mastered the art of war and managed to unite and lead the disparate gangs of L.A. That's not a typo; the hero of his series is a young black woman. This is a BIG deal. Genius has a rare opportunity to tie commentary about the long and chilling history of social and economic racial oppression to this rousing and frenetic ride of a story. I don't think it really achieves this. But I do think Genius can improve in upcoming issues, and I think it will.
Side notes: I think it's funny that numerous reviewers mention how unrealistic they found certain plot points to be, yet they've given positive reviews to Superman and Batman comics. Also, there are a few alternate covers included in the collection that are much preferable to the gratuitously sexy cover that they went with.
That being said, the premise behind Genius is powerful and thrilling. The hero is an orphaned, teenaged black girl from South Central who has mastered the art of war and managed to unite and lead the disparate gangs of L.A. That's not a typo; the hero of his series is a young black woman. This is a BIG deal. Genius has a rare opportunity to tie commentary about the long and chilling history of social and economic racial oppression to this rousing and frenetic ride of a story. I don't think it really achieves this. But I do think Genius can improve in upcoming issues, and I think it will.
Side notes: I think it's funny that numerous reviewers mention how unrealistic they found certain plot points to be, yet they've given positive reviews to Superman and Batman comics. Also, there are a few alternate covers included in the collection that are much preferable to the gratuitously sexy cover that they went with.
dorinlazar's review against another edition
2.0
She's a 17 years old genius; from the age of 7, alone on the streets, she steals one book of Sun Tzu and she's the biggest strategist the world has ever seen. So tired of the crime that people in her neighborhood do, and upset with the police who is apparently suspicious of people like her because they tend to transform everything in a violent slum, she takes the decision to kill some cops then block some streets and get almost everyone killed???
While the character might be a genius, the writers definitely are not. The whole thing doesn't make sense from start to end; I do get that they want a young black woman to be a powerful character, but sheesh, man, they really failed with this character.
So apparently, South Central LA is the kind of place that only has one or two entrances, is populated by people killing each other because the police doesn't do anything about them???, and is supplied from nowhere because the neighborhood can live without power and food for some time. So the usual wars that animate this warring neighborhood are suspended in order to fight the power (because, remember, kids, the cops don't stop them from killing each other), and they start killing cops which are generally white (although I would've expected more black cops in LA).
There is no logic in the raise to power of a 17 years old. There is no logic in the violence against the cops, nor in the „blocking of streets” that apparently works so well. The young genius basically manages to maintain a significant perimeter with a few thugs, because „she jinius”! Apparently better armed than the cops and SWAT, who all of a sudden are outsmarted by someone who stole a book on Sun Tzu and played chess. YES! POWER TO THE PEOPLE.
Sheesh. The only thing that's ok about this is the drawing and the lettering. Story wise it's in the minus 5 stars territory.
While the character might be a genius, the writers definitely are not. The whole thing doesn't make sense from start to end; I do get that they want a young black woman to be a powerful character, but sheesh, man, they really failed with this character.
So apparently, South Central LA is the kind of place that only has one or two entrances, is populated by people killing each other because the police doesn't do anything about them???, and is supplied from nowhere because the neighborhood can live without power and food for some time. So the usual wars that animate this warring neighborhood are suspended in order to fight the power (because, remember, kids, the cops don't stop them from killing each other), and they start killing cops which are generally white (although I would've expected more black cops in LA).
There is no logic in the raise to power of a 17 years old. There is no logic in the violence against the cops, nor in the „blocking of streets” that apparently works so well. The young genius basically manages to maintain a significant perimeter with a few thugs, because „she jinius”! Apparently better armed than the cops and SWAT, who all of a sudden are outsmarted by someone who stole a book on Sun Tzu and played chess. YES! POWER TO THE PEOPLE.
Sheesh. The only thing that's ok about this is the drawing and the lettering. Story wise it's in the minus 5 stars territory.
roxanamalinachirila's review against another edition
2.0
The premise is intereting: a black girl in a troubled neighborhood is the great military genius of our time, so she organizes the gangs into an army and fights against the police.
However, the weak points of the story...
- why did Destiny start a war that she had no way of winning and which would only get her people killed? Was it to get a job with the government? (Because it's absolutely obvious she can't win)
- she keeps *knowing* what the police will do, but we're never shown the process through which she figures out what will happen. She knows, okay? She knows. She's a genius, geniuses know these things.
- how did she train her people? Come on, she's got super-snipers.
- how much firepower *can* one single neighborhood get their hands on?
- she had way less trouble than many other gangsters when it came to acquiring power and holding on to it, didn't she?
Story, don't expect me to suspend my disbelief when you're not offering other things to base new beliefs on.
However, the weak points of the story...
- why did Destiny start a war that she had no way of winning and which would only get her people killed? Was it to get a job with the government? (Because it's absolutely obvious she can't win)
- she keeps *knowing* what the police will do, but we're never shown the process through which she figures out what will happen. She knows, okay? She knows. She's a genius, geniuses know these things.
- how did she train her people? Come on, she's got super-snipers.
- how much firepower *can* one single neighborhood get their hands on?
- she had way less trouble than many other gangsters when it came to acquiring power and holding on to it, didn't she?
Story, don't expect me to suspend my disbelief when you're not offering other things to base new beliefs on.
tangiblereads's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
tense
fast-paced
5.0
Genius Vol 1 is amazing. Don’t underestimate someone based on age and gender. The LAPD did and got their butts handed to them. This book started with a bang. I was engrossed the entire time. Lots of killing, violence, blood, death and not as much cussing as I would have thought. Shows when people get fed up and can organize, anything is possible. Graphics are crisp, easy to understand, realistic. Dialogue, although mostly tame, are also realistic. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Wish my library had the second volume.
trike's review against another edition
4.0
I thought about giving this 3 stars rather than 4 because it's too short. This feels like a comic book adaptation of a novel, more Cliff's Notes than complete. That said, it's really well written and the concept is interesting, so I decided to tip it over into 4-star land.
The basic idea is that the next military genius arises in the 'hood, specifically South Central Los Angeles, and it's a teenage girl named Destiny Ajaye. (Is that a shout-out to comedian Franklin Ajaye?) Events conspire to make her life a living hell, but instead of becoming self-destructive she turns her brilliance to getting revenge. At first this plays out in her gaming the system but she soon sets her sights higher. She wants to start a war with the police who killed her mother.
Thing is, she needs an army for that, so she begins to systematically use social engineering to achieve that end. For people who are gentler, such as the computer nerd she befriends in grade school, she uses persuasion. For criminals she uses violence and sex. She morphs her demeanor to suit the situation. She manipulates people for her own ends and they don't even realize they're being used because she knows exactly which buttons to push to get people to believe that what she wants is what they want.
I happen to know quite a few geniuses -- as in actual, out-think-you, always-five-steps-ahead-of-you geniuses -- so this rang true to me.
Being brilliant doesn't mean that you are rational. It frequently goes hand-in-hand with psychopathy. This is an extreme example, but when you are used to being the smartest person in the room all the time and it feels like the entire world is full of Joey Tribbianis, it does tend to make you think you're homo superior.
In my experience, genius comes in two distinct flavors: Mr. Spock/Sheldon Cooper types, and Genghis Khan types. Here we have the latter. The criminals who hack your computer or the guys at Enron are extremely smart; many of them are authentic geniuses. They just lack a conscience or empathy for others. For real-life examples, I refer you to [b:The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron|113576|The Smartest Guys in the Room The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron|Bethany McLean|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1309204701s/113576.jpg|1604] and [b:The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry|12391521|The Psychopath Test A Journey Through the Madness Industry|Jon Ronson|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1364166270s/12391521.jpg|14262366].
Destiny's story is an extreme example, but it's not actually impossible. You put someone like that in a situation that causes them to cross the line from productive member of society to destroyer and conqueror and you end up with Destiny.
The scariest part is the ending, which every review I've read so far has either missed or didn't think it pertinent to comment on: the war she starts with the LAPD, her dismembering of the local gangs as her army, the using of her friends and neighbors, the all-out street war she engages in with the National Guard... All of these are merely the prologue to her endgame. She literally did all of this, killed all of those people, just so she would get the attention of the federal government.
The entire story that you read here was preamble to her taking over the United States itself. What we have here is the origin story of a new Genghis Khan in the modern era, but it's merely the opening salvo of her ultimate goal.
Eep.
Some of this skates dangerously close to eugenics and if author Mark Bernardin were white instead of black, I could see someone calling it racist. But it's not. What we have here is a masterfully-told tale of an interesting idea that could conceivably happen if these specific events occurred. The fact that the confrontational aspects of this are currently playing out in the real world in places like Ferguson and Chicago underscores how this is just one step removed from reality.
Look at someone like Bree Newsome, the young black woman who took down the Confederate flag from in front of the Columbia, South Carolina, statehouse. She is articulate, intelligent, charismatic and willing to actually take big risks to accomplish her goals. Destiny Ajaye is the angrier Bree Newsome turned up to 11.
As I said up top, the only real failing of this story is that it is way, WAY too short. This needs to be an epic-length novel or a TV series like The Wire.
This is really good. Nearly as good as [b:100 Bullets|11117109|100 Bullets The Deluxe Edition Book I|Brian Azzarello|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388213748s/11117109.jpg|16039695]. The art is likewise terrific, although I did want it to sometimes be a tad less stylized. That's such a minor point, though, it's hardly worth mentioning.
The basic idea is that the next military genius arises in the 'hood, specifically South Central Los Angeles, and it's a teenage girl named Destiny Ajaye. (Is that a shout-out to comedian Franklin Ajaye?) Events conspire to make her life a living hell, but instead of becoming self-destructive she turns her brilliance to getting revenge. At first this plays out in her gaming the system but she soon sets her sights higher. She wants to start a war with the police who killed her mother.
Thing is, she needs an army for that, so she begins to systematically use social engineering to achieve that end. For people who are gentler, such as the computer nerd she befriends in grade school, she uses persuasion. For criminals she uses violence and sex. She morphs her demeanor to suit the situation. She manipulates people for her own ends and they don't even realize they're being used because she knows exactly which buttons to push to get people to believe that what she wants is what they want.
I happen to know quite a few geniuses -- as in actual, out-think-you, always-five-steps-ahead-of-you geniuses -- so this rang true to me.
Being brilliant doesn't mean that you are rational. It frequently goes hand-in-hand with psychopathy. This is an extreme example, but when you are used to being the smartest person in the room all the time and it feels like the entire world is full of Joey Tribbianis, it does tend to make you think you're homo superior.
In my experience, genius comes in two distinct flavors: Mr. Spock/Sheldon Cooper types, and Genghis Khan types. Here we have the latter. The criminals who hack your computer or the guys at Enron are extremely smart; many of them are authentic geniuses. They just lack a conscience or empathy for others. For real-life examples, I refer you to [b:The Smartest Guys in the Room: The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron|113576|The Smartest Guys in the Room The Amazing Rise and Scandalous Fall of Enron|Bethany McLean|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1309204701s/113576.jpg|1604] and [b:The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry|12391521|The Psychopath Test A Journey Through the Madness Industry|Jon Ronson|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1364166270s/12391521.jpg|14262366].
Destiny's story is an extreme example, but it's not actually impossible. You put someone like that in a situation that causes them to cross the line from productive member of society to destroyer and conqueror and you end up with Destiny.
The scariest part is the ending, which every review I've read so far has either missed or didn't think it pertinent to comment on: the war she starts with the LAPD, her dismembering of the local gangs as her army, the using of her friends and neighbors, the all-out street war she engages in with the National Guard... All of these are merely the prologue to her endgame. She literally did all of this, killed all of those people, just so she would get the attention of the federal government.
The entire story that you read here was preamble to her taking over the United States itself. What we have here is the origin story of a new Genghis Khan in the modern era, but it's merely the opening salvo of her ultimate goal.
Eep.
Some of this skates dangerously close to eugenics and if author Mark Bernardin were white instead of black, I could see someone calling it racist. But it's not. What we have here is a masterfully-told tale of an interesting idea that could conceivably happen if these specific events occurred. The fact that the confrontational aspects of this are currently playing out in the real world in places like Ferguson and Chicago underscores how this is just one step removed from reality.
Look at someone like Bree Newsome, the young black woman who took down the Confederate flag from in front of the Columbia, South Carolina, statehouse. She is articulate, intelligent, charismatic and willing to actually take big risks to accomplish her goals. Destiny Ajaye is the angrier Bree Newsome turned up to 11.
As I said up top, the only real failing of this story is that it is way, WAY too short. This needs to be an epic-length novel or a TV series like The Wire.
This is really good. Nearly as good as [b:100 Bullets|11117109|100 Bullets The Deluxe Edition Book I|Brian Azzarello|https://d.gr-assets.com/books/1388213748s/11117109.jpg|16039695]. The art is likewise terrific, although I did want it to sometimes be a tad less stylized. That's such a minor point, though, it's hardly worth mentioning.
djotaku's review against another edition
4.0
Visit http://www.comicpow.com/2015/06/10/genius-inevitable-future/ for the original post which contains images and links
---
When I was doing my undergraduate degree, we were just getting cell phones that could take sub-megapixel images. There was no video in most phones, and those that did shot videos that would show the size of a postage stamp on today’s monitors. Some of my friends and colleagues who were of African descent would talk about how black people got higher prison sentences for weed possession in the USA than whites. When I heard this, from my position of privilege in which I’d only once ever had to deal with racism (I’m ethnically Hispanic, but racially white), it was hard to have sympathy. Yeah, it was profoundly unfair that the same crime did not get the same punishment, but it’s not like weed was legal back then. You knew what you were getting into if you chose to do something illegal. It’d be like getting mad for going to jail for stealing something.
Jump forward a decade and we have cell phones that can shoot high definition video and 4G networks and citizen journalism and YouTube for when the media wants to ignore a story until it’s viral. What I’ve learned over the past 2-3 years is that the weed issue was just the tippy top of a HUGE iceberg of abuses rained upon African Americans (with some run-off affecting others with non-white skin) that were easy to ignore before the video footage. The experience of someone with privilege is so radically different that depictions of cops drawing guns for no reason just sounded like hyperbole.
Then Genius came out exactly as Ferguson, Missouri was blowing up over the presumed wrongful death of an African-American young man at the hands of the cops. Regardless of the details that eventually emerged, it wasn’t so much that the cops shot this guy a year after stand your ground in Florida. It was as though a damn had burst and suddenly the media was paying attention to the videos being posted to the net. Soon another black man was killed over selling of cigarettes in New York City. Not that long ago, it was my city’s turn as Baltimore went nuts over the wrongful death of an African-American in police custody.
I am enough of a printed word nerd to understand how the publishing world works. The link above goes to an AV Club story in which writers Marc Bernardin and Adam Freeman discuss that this story was six years in the making. But even if you don’t believe that, the piplines in publishing are such that Top Cow (Image imprint) had to have sent the first issue to be made somewhere between two and four months before the events of Ferguson. It’s been in the air for a long time – we were just ignorant of it outside the community.
So how does this long introduction intersect with Genius? Well, if this somehow slipped under your radar (maybe you only read from the Big Two), Genius is the story of a tactical genius who happens to be born on the wrong side of the tracks. In times past, this would have relegated her to a footnote in history. Sure, some upstarts came from unimportant families, but many of the great leaders of history had privilege to place them in positions of power. But today. at this point in history, anyone can be disruptive. This loophole may eventually be closed by the powers that be, but with social media, cheap video production, and guerilla tactics, someone with the right brains could end up making quite the statement nowadays. Destiny, our main character, decides she’s had enough of the police misconduct and wages what is in effect a terrorist war on the police to make her point.
Without a doubt, Bernardin and Freeman take some liberties for the sake of plot. When Destiny makes the correct military decision to risk some casualties to inflict major casualties on the police, she finds herself at the wrong end of a bunch of guns from those upset they were used as pawns. She uses machismo to talk her way out of it. Similarly, when she social engineers her way into a police station, she certainly is using the important tactic of seeming like you belong to make sure no one questions you. But with the way things are nowadays with RFID badges and other checks and balances, it’s unlikely she would have been able to get in and out successfully.
That said, two things made the book stand out to me. First was Destiny’s use of every advantage possible to attain her goal. For her nothing is more important than the ends and all means are justified. She purposely tries to blend in until the time is right for her to strike. This involves, first of all, not rising above the mean in school. This is both a comment from the writers on her tactical planning as well as a statement on how African Americans often feel as though they shouldn’t try and stand out, lest they become a target for being beat up. Then she uses her female identity and sex in every possible way. First, she uses it literally to become the girlfriend of a gang leader and learn the system so she can move from a position of power. On the day that she takes over all the gangs, she uses her femininity and gender biases in her favor because no one suspects her of being a takeover threat. She also uses her female hairdo to hide weapons even though they’ve been frisked.
The second thing that made the book stand out to me was that, as I mentioned above, the tools are there for something like this to be real. Destiny takes advantage of the media situation to release information showing that the police they killed were corrupt. She also shows videos of regular folks from that area that have been harassed by the cops. The war of ideas quickly becomes one in which victims are fighting for their lives rather than the usual “thugs causing problems”. Bernardin and Freeman also ask the reader to think about how he’s viewing the situation as well. When Destiny is sent on her initiation killing it appears to be the heartless killing of a fast food worker. But in the last panel it’s revealed that he’s a member of the opposing gang. While that doesn’t make the killing right, it’s certainly not as random and cold blooded as it originally seemed.
The writers also use Detective Grey as an example of how biases lead us astray. Although he’s been working on this case for five years, it’s only a loud-mouthed kid that tips him off to the fact that the mastermind is a woman. Additionally, he’s an example of how the system fails those who need it most. There are many non-fiction accounts of how people’s lives are tuned upside-down by encounters with the police and most of the time they get a shrug and a non-apology. In the best case scenario they get some money that doesn’t return their dead family or make then un-disabled. Detective Grey was there when Destiny’s family was shot by the cops and the unfairness and inaction cemented her desire to screw with the system.
Ignoring the last page which is either the most accurate ending (think Frank Abdegnale or Kevin Mittnick) or the most wishful thinking ending, the book leaves us with the question that sparked my title for this post and that has been bouncing around my head after a year in which nothing has changed and my own backyard has become a battleground:
No. The question you should be asking is “when”? When will it happen in my neighborhood? When will they say “I’ve had enough”? Civilization is nothing but a collection of agreements made between people to work together towards a common goal. How long before people feel like those agreements aren't in their best interest?
After the evils of the financial crisis were met with a few months of protest and a yawn; after decades of mistreatment for African Americans, including a year in which incidents were caught on video without much action – I’ve been asking myself the same questions. Because, as a student of history I know that revolutions are never quite as neat as they seem when we read them in the history books. It would really be better if we could resolve this in a civilized and fair manner, before the social contract erodes. It’s not so easy to put it back together after it falls apart – ask the Egyptians.
---
When I was doing my undergraduate degree, we were just getting cell phones that could take sub-megapixel images. There was no video in most phones, and those that did shot videos that would show the size of a postage stamp on today’s monitors. Some of my friends and colleagues who were of African descent would talk about how black people got higher prison sentences for weed possession in the USA than whites. When I heard this, from my position of privilege in which I’d only once ever had to deal with racism (I’m ethnically Hispanic, but racially white), it was hard to have sympathy. Yeah, it was profoundly unfair that the same crime did not get the same punishment, but it’s not like weed was legal back then. You knew what you were getting into if you chose to do something illegal. It’d be like getting mad for going to jail for stealing something.
Jump forward a decade and we have cell phones that can shoot high definition video and 4G networks and citizen journalism and YouTube for when the media wants to ignore a story until it’s viral. What I’ve learned over the past 2-3 years is that the weed issue was just the tippy top of a HUGE iceberg of abuses rained upon African Americans (with some run-off affecting others with non-white skin) that were easy to ignore before the video footage. The experience of someone with privilege is so radically different that depictions of cops drawing guns for no reason just sounded like hyperbole.
Then Genius came out exactly as Ferguson, Missouri was blowing up over the presumed wrongful death of an African-American young man at the hands of the cops. Regardless of the details that eventually emerged, it wasn’t so much that the cops shot this guy a year after stand your ground in Florida. It was as though a damn had burst and suddenly the media was paying attention to the videos being posted to the net. Soon another black man was killed over selling of cigarettes in New York City. Not that long ago, it was my city’s turn as Baltimore went nuts over the wrongful death of an African-American in police custody.
I am enough of a printed word nerd to understand how the publishing world works. The link above goes to an AV Club story in which writers Marc Bernardin and Adam Freeman discuss that this story was six years in the making. But even if you don’t believe that, the piplines in publishing are such that Top Cow (Image imprint) had to have sent the first issue to be made somewhere between two and four months before the events of Ferguson. It’s been in the air for a long time – we were just ignorant of it outside the community.
So how does this long introduction intersect with Genius? Well, if this somehow slipped under your radar (maybe you only read from the Big Two), Genius is the story of a tactical genius who happens to be born on the wrong side of the tracks. In times past, this would have relegated her to a footnote in history. Sure, some upstarts came from unimportant families, but many of the great leaders of history had privilege to place them in positions of power. But today. at this point in history, anyone can be disruptive. This loophole may eventually be closed by the powers that be, but with social media, cheap video production, and guerilla tactics, someone with the right brains could end up making quite the statement nowadays. Destiny, our main character, decides she’s had enough of the police misconduct and wages what is in effect a terrorist war on the police to make her point.
Without a doubt, Bernardin and Freeman take some liberties for the sake of plot. When Destiny makes the correct military decision to risk some casualties to inflict major casualties on the police, she finds herself at the wrong end of a bunch of guns from those upset they were used as pawns. She uses machismo to talk her way out of it. Similarly, when she social engineers her way into a police station, she certainly is using the important tactic of seeming like you belong to make sure no one questions you. But with the way things are nowadays with RFID badges and other checks and balances, it’s unlikely she would have been able to get in and out successfully.
That said, two things made the book stand out to me. First was Destiny’s use of every advantage possible to attain her goal. For her nothing is more important than the ends and all means are justified. She purposely tries to blend in until the time is right for her to strike. This involves, first of all, not rising above the mean in school. This is both a comment from the writers on her tactical planning as well as a statement on how African Americans often feel as though they shouldn’t try and stand out, lest they become a target for being beat up. Then she uses her female identity and sex in every possible way. First, she uses it literally to become the girlfriend of a gang leader and learn the system so she can move from a position of power. On the day that she takes over all the gangs, she uses her femininity and gender biases in her favor because no one suspects her of being a takeover threat. She also uses her female hairdo to hide weapons even though they’ve been frisked.
The second thing that made the book stand out to me was that, as I mentioned above, the tools are there for something like this to be real. Destiny takes advantage of the media situation to release information showing that the police they killed were corrupt. She also shows videos of regular folks from that area that have been harassed by the cops. The war of ideas quickly becomes one in which victims are fighting for their lives rather than the usual “thugs causing problems”. Bernardin and Freeman also ask the reader to think about how he’s viewing the situation as well. When Destiny is sent on her initiation killing it appears to be the heartless killing of a fast food worker. But in the last panel it’s revealed that he’s a member of the opposing gang. While that doesn’t make the killing right, it’s certainly not as random and cold blooded as it originally seemed.
The writers also use Detective Grey as an example of how biases lead us astray. Although he’s been working on this case for five years, it’s only a loud-mouthed kid that tips him off to the fact that the mastermind is a woman. Additionally, he’s an example of how the system fails those who need it most. There are many non-fiction accounts of how people’s lives are tuned upside-down by encounters with the police and most of the time they get a shrug and a non-apology. In the best case scenario they get some money that doesn’t return their dead family or make then un-disabled. Detective Grey was there when Destiny’s family was shot by the cops and the unfairness and inaction cemented her desire to screw with the system.
Ignoring the last page which is either the most accurate ending (think Frank Abdegnale or Kevin Mittnick) or the most wishful thinking ending, the book leaves us with the question that sparked my title for this post and that has been bouncing around my head after a year in which nothing has changed and my own backyard has become a battleground:
No. The question you should be asking is “when”? When will it happen in my neighborhood? When will they say “I’ve had enough”? Civilization is nothing but a collection of agreements made between people to work together towards a common goal. How long before people feel like those agreements aren't in their best interest?
After the evils of the financial crisis were met with a few months of protest and a yawn; after decades of mistreatment for African Americans, including a year in which incidents were caught on video without much action – I’ve been asking myself the same questions. Because, as a student of history I know that revolutions are never quite as neat as they seem when we read them in the history books. It would really be better if we could resolve this in a civilized and fair manner, before the social contract erodes. It’s not so easy to put it back together after it falls apart – ask the Egyptians.
redbecca's review against another edition
3.0
This felt very 90's to me - revolution as brought on by gang truce vs. LAPD. It was nice to see a woman as the leader.
iliapop's review against another edition
4.0
The book has a great concept – military genius grows up in LA's crime-ridden underword, unites the gangs and takes on a corrupt police force – and executes it very well. Every issue pounds with action set-pieces, while choice use of flashback does a good job of providing an origin story for the main character. Afua Richardson handles all the art and has a superb eye for design and layouts, although you can tell some corners were cut when it comes to the backgrounds, colouring and lighting effects.
inkpressedpage's review against another edition
4.0
This blew my mind. Not at all what I was expecting. Very relevant to the social climate right now although extreme. Very violent amazing Art.
scripturient's review
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.0