By Dustin Cabeal
There’s aspects of Antique that I like, but others I’m not fond of. The storytelling and pacing is skilled and keeps the story interesting. The art… is not for me. Hey, I like a variety of styles, but this isn’t one I’m enjoying. It was difficult getting through the issue because I couldn’t get into the art.
The story is about an old woman that is down to the last of her food and has no money. She decides to sell the last thing she owns, her grandfather’s sword. The pawn shop makes her a decent offer, but seeing that she’s in a tight spot offers her a job using the sword. If she goes and collects money owed to him, he’s double his offer on her sword. Intercut with this is the old woman in her younger days. I won’t say what she’s doing, but it does make you wonder how much sympathy you should have for her.
The world that Matt Lesniewski has built is interesting. It’s dystopian, but old feeling. Everyone is a bastard, and you must wonder how the hell there’s anything you can call a society present. It’s like Mad Max’s younger sibling, not as fucking crazy, but still pretty crazy. Point in case, when the old woman and the pawn shop worker attempt to leave the city, they’re jumped by random dudes just looking to kill or take whatever they have. This is apparently the norm and sends a message to others in the area to back off. They make it out to the forest only to run into a new type of danger.
The dialogue stumbles in places. It’s not perfect, but it’s very strong. Both timelines are believable and paint a very different character in both. It’s strange because as the reader it’s not clear what Lesniewski is going for just yet, but I’m interested to find out more.
The art, with my personal tastes aside, needs some work. All the pages are blown out because the line work is clean and the thin. There’s a decent amount of detail, but it’s lost in all the white. The greyscale is really just one shade of grey and isn’t used effectively enough to make up for all the white. It’s begging to be colored, but because it’s not this weakens the art’s approach leaving it feeling flat and without depth.
If the second issue showed up in my inbox, I would read it. I don’t know if I would chase it down, but I can see others really enjoying it especially if it was their first indie comics. As I said, the storytelling is skilled and shows a lot of promise for the next three issues. The art, while not my personal taste, is still skilled but needs some work to help the story effectively.
Keep making comics.
Score: 3/5
Antique #1
Creator: Matt Lesniewski
Self-Published
MattDrawsComics.com