“Crave” #1

I don’t think I’m being controversial when I say this, but high school is rough. Even if it seems that you’ve got everything under control, even if you’re one of the popular kids whom everyone adores, or even if you come from the kind of money where the solutions to all of your problems can be bought away, sticking a bunch of inexperienced, overworked, overstimulated hormone monsters together in the same building is a recipe for disaster.

No, I’m not JUST venting about my own time in high school, I’m talking about today’s comic: “Crave” #1.

CONTENT WARNING: This book contains sexually explicit material and if this book were to have a rating, it would probably get a light “R” rating. There is no full nudity, but there are some pretty graphic depictions of sex which some readers may find uncomfortable. Also, this book is definitely NOT for young readers.

Cover by: Maria Llovet

Written by Maria Llovet
Illustrated and colored by Maria Llovet
Lettered by Maria Llovet

MINISERIES PREMIERE
CRAVE, a mysterious app that promises to make your desires come true, spreads among the students of an elite university who use it as a hookup app.
David, a top student, engages in a game of seduction with the unattainable Alexandra.
But as requests to the app escalate and wreak havoc on campus, David and his friends’ only chance to stop this spiral is to find out what really lies behind Crave.

“Crave” #1 is set in an unnamed elite preparatory school. It’s the kind of place where the children of the incredibly rich and powerful send their kids to be educated and to get to know each other so they can network and continue their relationships into adulthood. So not only are the usual tropes of highschool drama and social hierarchy on full display here, there’s an added element of money and power.

Into this mix comes Crave, a mysterious app that suddenly appeared on everyone’s phone and promises the user the ability to give them whatever they want and to “satisfy their cravings”. This quickly devolves into a messy, complicated, and steamy web of teen romance, sexual tension, and broken hearts. Into this mess steps David Brown, a smart, capable, and handsome student in the school who is dating one of the richest girls on campus, but everything changes when he gets a mysterious picture through the app showing another female student in a compromising photo. What follows is a massive upheaval of social order and norms as the entire campus begins to devolve into a mess of lust, desire, and submission to everything they secretly crave.

“Crave” #1 is written by Maria Llovet, a Spanish artist who has made a name for herself drawing teen drama comics with a very unique style and extremely sexual overtones. This comic is clearly in her wheelhouse (it’s right there on the cover) so if you’re a fan of Llovet’s work, you will definitely like this. Llovet captures the stakes of high school drama and romance perfectly, which is to say the stakes appear a lot bigger than they actually are and that children of this age tend to overreact to situations and drama that is usually inconsequential in the grand scheme of their lives. With that being said, there is still an element of danger and mystery to this book, and Llovet does a great job of showing how an app can use people’s data to cripple the social order and plunge everything into chaos.

While “Crave” #1 has some good character work, along with some very juicy and explicit drama worthy of the grandest of soap operas, it is treading on very familiar ground and themes that have been discussed before in greater detail by other creators. Llovet seems to be trying to make a point about the dangers of being addicted to social media and while it is certainly a topical point and relevant to today’s environment, it is a little heavy handed and doesn’t have any new insights to the conversation. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, it’s just that if you’re looking for any sort of new insight into how smartphones are ruining our lives you’re not going to find it here.

The story of “Crave” #1 may be a little heavy handed, but the highlight of the book (along with Maria Llovet’s entire body of work) is the artwork. Llovet provides the art and design for “Crave” #1 as well and it seems that this is where she placed most of her attention and prodigious talent. Llovet has a very unique style that combines realistic artwork with simple, thin lines that give the book a feel that is both unique and very pretty to look at. The characters and setting have realistic proportions and appearances, but there’s a hint of the fantastic sprinkled in that makes the people look like porcelain dolls and the setting look like a high end dollhouse. Even the supposed nerdy and unattractive people look gorgeous, which serves the story well when it starts showing the steamy and explicit stuff. On top of that, the muted color palette gives the comic a rich, heavy feel and makes the book feel like it was drawn on high end paper, adding a rich feel to the story that highlights the setting and the eroticism of the book.

That’s not to say that Llovet’s art style is perfect. The biggest thing you notice in “Crave” #1 is that since the characters look like china dolls, they do have a habit of sharing similar facial features and that there isn’t a single ugly person in the setting, but that’s certainly not the point of the book and would probably detract from what Llovet is trying to do with the story, so it’s not that big of a problem.

“Crave” #1 is a classic high school drama but with the explicit details turned up to eleven. While the stakes may be comparatively low, it certainly feels epic and a little bit dangerous and is definitely a good book for anyone who is a fan of the creator’s specific brand of storytelling and art.

Final Verdict: 8.6- It’s a gorgeous looking book that doesn’t have a lot of new things to say, but it handles high school drama well and has some absolutely gorgeous art.