Comics Features

REVIEW: Silicon Heart

So I picked up this gem from a former AP2HYC writer who now writes his own comics. Given the opportunity to read this from an alumnus, here is my review of his recently funded Silicon Heart.

The story is about a girl who is being picked on at school and meets a cyborg whom she befriends. Society frowns upon such a relationship and thus begins our journey between our two protagonists. The story is very similar to A.I. and I am Robot in a sense of robots live in society but are not often accepted as part of the civilization. People tend to frown upon such beings living in the same vicinity as them. These types of relationships are not uncommon in this genre, and have been written about many times in the past.

The difference between this scenario is that we are following two high school couples and their journey into facing their adversities in this particular setting, whereas the films listed above focused more on adult themes and following adventures in the world beyond our own. I guess it’s very niched in this comic since it revolves mostly around their experience in dealing with other high schoolers and it doesn’t want to go beyond its limitations. The plus side of this is that it gets to focus more on the surroundings of that particular town and its residents, and it helps build the characters, much like the Simpsons. Knowing its limitations and building off of that helps the comic create more content with its characters and its backgrounds.

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The characters I feel are very straight forward. You’ve got your bullies, your two protagonists who don’t belong and find each other, your popular girls and fakers. It’s almost like a scene from Harry Potter. The characters don’t feel very original, and compared to other comic books or stories, they’re very one-dimensional. Unfortunately, their personalities are too similar, and it becomes stale very fast. The audience can relate to the characters and their experiences and there’s nothing superficial about their origins, but the fact that this story offers nothing really different and unique compared to other stories, it can become its downfall later on.

As I mentioned above, the town is small, and the characters are constricted within the perimeters the author gave to them, so there’s time to build them. It’s a good start of a new series for those who have the patience to sit through each issue and experience the journey with its characters. However, given the attention span of the recent generations, if you don’t catch their eye within the first issue or two, the series can have a hard time building itself up to the rest of the hype.

Given that there’s no real action in this genre, I’ll cut straight to the chase. I personally do not mind the premise and the plot of this comic, but I can see it having a hard time picking itself up in the later issues. It’s hard to get into something that starts out very one-dimensional and straight-forward. Compared to other comics, there needs to be mystery, something that entices the audience to read further to find out or a character that they can relate to or care about. There is no definitive goal in this story and it’s hard to invest your time into a comic that doesn’t state its goal within the first issue. The questions I would ask is, “Where are they going with this?” or “Why should I follow these characters through their high school life?”. As much as I want to invest my time in following an unorthodox relationship, it doesn’t give much room for me to really stretch my imagination. A good comic allows imagination towards its mystery. It’s simple storytelling. When you’re putting everything on the plate and you tell the audience that that’s all there is to it, it becomes bland and boring.

This comic is a good fit for those just starting to get into comics, but I wouldn’t recommend this to veterans like myself who grew up on old comic books and noir story telling.

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About the author

Kenny Yu

I do all things that entertain such as writing, reviewing, critiquing, streaming, photo shoots and video shoots. I also cosplay as well. Follow me on Facebook!