Keenspot 2020
Created, Written, Coloured & Lettered by Billy Parker
Illustrated by Alex Smith
Additional Inks by Marcus Cripps
Zander meets the patients and learns that there is more to the story than he previously believed. The supernatural make their presents known by creating chaos in the ward... The chaos brings Zander and the team together to hunt for those responsible, and find a few allies along the way.
Keenspot may be a T+ centred company but I would definitely say that this is for everyone who loves comics. I am so impressed with the quality of storytelling they bring us in such a consistent manner. So while more than a few of you may not know about them or thought that it was kids stuff well this is the perfect time to check em out and learn that you've got some misconceptions. Last issue we were introduced to the series and here we see things tart to take off even further. This has the progression where each issue is better than the one before which is what I love to see because that shows me a writer who understands how to structure a story over multiple issues. I appreciate finding this kind of talent and it needs to be seen by anyone who loves comics.
I am a huge fan of the way that this is being told. The story & plot development that we see through how the sequence of events unfold as well as how the reader learns information are presented beautifully. I love how natural and normal it feels to follow Zander through his rounds and his day, more so in seeing him purposefully accosted while thinking it's his fault. What we see as we travel through the pages it really just makes sense and feel as if this isn't scripted if that makes sense. The character development we see is phenomenal and how we see the characters act and react to the circumstances and situations they find themselves in show us a lot about them. The pacing is fantastic and as it takes us through the pages revealing the twists and turns along the way we see how everything works together to create the ebb & flow for the book.
There is something happening here, what it is ain't exactly clear, there's a man with a grudge over there telling me I got to beware. Stop children what's that sound, everybody look what's going down. This the soundtrack for this book in my head as I read it. To me this means that I have connected with the story on a few levels and that's when you subconsciously realise that. This is so well written and with such layers and interest factors going on that it's near impossible to escape it's gravitational pull.
I rather like the interiors here. There is something nice and strong about the lines and then how we see the varying weights being utilised to bring out the attention to detail is utterly marvellous. We all know that I am the guy who constantly asks for more backgrounds but here you can see so many different techniques of linework utilised to create subliminal imagery in them instead of just leaving them completely blank. It bloody effin brilliant to see. The utilisation of the page layouts and how we see the angles and perspective in the panels show this really strong and creative eye for storytelling. Also I like how we see depth perception, scale and that overall sense of size and scope to the book. The colour work is very interesting as well. I like how different colours pop in different ways. How we see the hues and tones within the colours being utilised to showcase the shading, highlights and shadow work is really nice to see.
This just keeps picking up steam with every turn of the page. The way this is crafted and how we learn what's going on is phenomenally well rendered. The whole book is just bloody brilliantly mindbogglingly well done.