Comic Review: Echo Gear #1

Echo Gear is the new comic released on December 29 by Rosarium Publishing. Echo Gear is written and illustrated by Vincent Sammy. Sammy has a history of high quality work, even appearing in films such as "Chronicle." Some of his other art can be seen on Deviant Art. You can also keep up with him on Twitter @karbonK. Echo Gear is a very unique comic to say the least. I have never read anything like Echo Gear and I actually had to read through it a few times to figure out what was going on and even now, I'm still a little lost. The series is described as follows:

"Echo Gear is a 'hybrid codex,' a mash up of imagery, text, sequential art, editorial and advertorial nodes. A story told in codes, puzzles, wordplay, and cross-referenced archaic media."

I have never read a truer description of a comic, book or film before. Even when knowing what you're getting into it can be hard to digest.

The first thing you'll notice is the art. The art is just incredible and there is no other way to describe it. Echo Gear is almost worth the purchase purely based on the art. Sammy is an experienced artist and it shows. None of his characters are similar in any way which is a trap many artist can fall into. One thing to notice is the incredible amount of detail put into everything. Characters, backdrops and even the puzzles included are all extreamly detailed. On one page there is an octopus and each of the individual suckers is visible. In the distance is a dismembered tentacle, much further away, still detailed the same. In another scene a battle ship is split in half and laying prone with it's inner workings exposed. It's interesting when you consider the amount of work that went into each of these scenes. The art is without a doubt the strongest part of Echo Gear.

With that being said, the story is the weak point. It's told through sentenced fragments, news clippings, puzzles, poetry and images. I've read through a few times and what I can piece together follows. During a war, possible World War II, there were a group of people with special abilities who were mutated. These are the test subjects. They were on a ship that either crashed or was destroyed and they landed in South Africa. The thing is, I could be 100% wrong about all of that. That's what I pieced together from the puzzles and images. I'll even admit I'm just not smart enough to complete the crossword puzzle and I don't think a dictionary will help me in this case. The answers are likely hidden in the book. The cool thing about this story is that it's told in such a unique way. While this doesn't exactly allow for great detail to be explored and it will cause some people to back away it is unique. There's no other book like it that I know of. For someone who loves puzzles this book would probably heaven for them. For others it would be a pain in the ass and many would fall in between those two categories like myself. 

Echo Gear is really fun to look at, it's a beautiful book. The problem is that for most people, they'll have no idea what is going on and they'll put the book down. Maybe in subsequent issues it becomes more obvious what is happening as other pieces of the puzzle are revealed. However I don't know if many people will keep reading if they are put off by the first issue. It's something that will grab your interest but can it hold it? People read comics to escape their daily life and I'm not sure if they want to solve puzzles only to get a piece of the story and wait until the next issue to get more of it.

You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet
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