You get it at this point: we I love all-ages comics. One of the newest on the block is Ray Sumser’s “LYK and Bear,” a comic described by its creator as being build of everyday objects in toys “in the hopes that if the story caught on, fans could play out adventures with readily available props.” It’s a relatively simple premise, but that’s sometimes the beauty of great all-ages material; a not too complex concept carried by solid execution. Of course, you’re always taking a bet on that latter part with a Kickstarter project, but by the preview pages we’ve been given, I think we’re safe.
One of my favorite things about the preview pages Sumser provides is the tasteful color palette he uses. The comic is build on solids, with only subtle shading to add depth. At a glance, it looks simple, but with a closer look one can see the very minute detailing that Sumser works into his drawings. The problem you often see with the colors in all-ages comics — and some superhero ones — is that the bright coloring is often selected haphazardly, resulting in a pallete that is too bright, too bold. Garish coloring does nothing for a comic: it distracts, and can turn a well-composed page into an eyesore. Sumser’s colors, though, are delightful; they are certainly striking, but they don’t blare. This is especially impressive with some of the shades Sumser chooses — a little bit of a tweak, and they would easily be “too much,” but as they are, they’re just right.
The best news about this? It takes only a dollar to get the .pdf of a twenty-two page comic. On top of that, the comic is finished — if you don’t believe me, there’s a small picture of every page on the Kickstarter page — so almost as soon as the project’s timeframe is up, it’ll be yours. Hard to beat that. Of course, there are more options: if you want a physical copy of the issue (which is the goal of this Kickstarter), it’s the reward for a $10.00 donation, including stickers of the main characters. If you want more copies, it’s $5.00 extra for each. Another neat, slightly budget incentive is the one-of-a-kind variant: for $50.00, your issue will have a drawing of any character you want one the front. There are only two particularly high-cost incentives, which are the $500.00 and $1,500.00, each of which earn you a front-page “producer” credit, and an original oil painting (the different tiers come with different size paintings).
“LYK and Bear” has a reasonable goal of $3,000.00, a great $1.00 incentive, and — best of all — it looks great. I highly recommend sharing this project with every lover of all-ages comics you know — in the age of the internet, three thousand one dollar donations should be easy as pie. Let’s hit those stretch goals.
