What if everything and everybody around you were slowly being turned into machines? High concept doesn’t get much higher than this, but the first volume of “Archeologists of Shadows” from Septagon Studios delivers the goods in high style.
Written by Lara Fuentes
Illustrated by Patricio ClareyIn a world where every living thing is forced to become mechanical, the Authorities punish those who resist the transformation, although all wonder about the real reason for the changes.
Baltimo and Alix were born on a train, and have been in the process of getting… well, somewhere, anywhere, their whole lives. But as the authorities supervise the gradual process of their mechanization, Baltimo and Alix realize that their own negative attitude against the process is causing it to move more slowly. This very near makes them criminals in the eyes of the law, leaving them with no option but to flee and join the growing resistance movement. Proceeding with the logic of a dream — or a nightmare — their adventure takes them away from the city sprawl and into the company of a mysterious hermit, who seems to know more about them than they do…
In the arc of the plot and the leitmotifs of the art (cogs, barcodes, and yes, smog), this is very much a steampunk story, and a big steampunk story at that. The tale as a whole comes across with a kind of mythic grandeur, and it’s tempting to read the whole thing as an elaborate allegory. The trouble with big stories, though, is that they tend toward abstraction, and the result in this case is that the characters wind up feeling underdeveloped. It’s like their personalities are insignificant compared to their dire situation, so they get subsumed. And so, while the conversations between them betray some differences in opinion and overall approach, Alix and Baltimo don’t come across as individuals or real agents; the story is moving them along, and not the other way around.
This isn’t an inherently flawed way of structuring a story, though, and if you step back a few paces from the individual pieces of this work it’s easy to appreciate the ambition and the scope of the project. The heart of the tale, after all, is easy to get at and relate to (at least, for anyone who has every worked a full time job), and the overall mood of this couple’s adventure — vaguely rebellious, mostly hopeful, and very worried — rings true.
As for Clarey’s art, have you ever wondered what “Sandman” would be like if the interiors were made to match Dave McKean’s dazzling covers? Making use of a variety of media and techniques (encompassing drawing, digital painting, photography, photo manipulation, and even sculpture), Clarey crafts a similarly dreamy and surreal landscape with every page while still coming up with something that feels fresh and unique, somethings that mixes and melds steampunk elements to awesome effect. The staggering element here is the wealth and choice of detail, making it difficult, at certain pages, not to stare.
There are a couple of seamy spots in this book, however, where the variety of media works against the integrity of the pages: sometimes the images seem obviously stitched together, and sometimes there will be a bit too much blur gluing the settings and figures together (I found myself squinting at one point). These problems come up mostly during a bright, daytime scene early in the book, though, and the gloomier ones have a much more coherent feel.
The facial expressions could be stronger, too, but then, the landscapes — and the elaborately mechanized bodies, rendered, like everything else, with careful and creative detail — so often come to the forefront that this aspect is actually quite easy to miss.
Overall, Clarey’s art is deeply impressive, and more than worth the price of admission in itself. (The volume is also packed with wonderful extras which explore the process behind the art, and these are lovely to look at as well). Paired up with the epic story, though, they add up to an absorbing and thought-provoking tale that, flaws notwithstanding, is as much a pleasure for the eyes as it is a panacea for anyone who’s every felt caught up in a process beyond their control.
For those interested in immersing themselves even further in this story, a second volume (“Once a Nightmare”) is now available from Graphicly.
Final Verdict: 8.1 — Buy
