Comic Review - NorthStars Volume 1

With the holiday season in full swing and everyone gearing up for Christmas and other winter holidays, lots of people are in the mood for some good holiday specials. While Christmas themed comics are rather rare, some options can be found. One such story is the light fantasy adventure comic NorthStars. Can this book put you in the holiday spirit?

Let’s look at NorthStars.

STORY

The story takes place in the magical region of Polaris, located in the area around Earth’s North Pole, and the residents of the town of Snowville, where Santa Claus lives, are getting ready for Christmas. Our two protagonists are Holly Claus, Santa’s daughter, and Frostina, the princess of the yetis, while the dark Christmas demon Krampus appears as our main villain. When Krampus steals a magical artifact that Santa needs for his Christmas deliveries, Holly and Frostina take it upon themselves to get it back and save the holiday.

The story is a nice little adventure. The girls do come across some genuine threats and switch between either fighting through them (with Frostina doing most of the fighting) or solving them with some creative thinking. There are also some good jokes peppered throughout the story, reminiscent of Adventure Time. While there isn’t any deeper story going on, at least in this volume, traveling with these characters and learning more about the world they inhabit and the kinds of other creatures and characters that live in it is itself engaging.

CHARACTERS

The characters that get the most exploration in this story are Holly, Frostina, and Krampus, as we see how they behave around others and what their motivations are. Sorry if you expect to see Santa appear throughout, but he only appears briefly at the start and in flashbacks. There isn’t much character development in the protagonists, as Holly and Frostina aren’t challenged in any big way, but since there are other comics in this series, this can be seen as more of an introduction to the characters and the world. We learn a few small things about the characters, like Holly being able to jump higher than a normal person and Frostina being very strong, and we are sure to learn more about them as the series progresses.

We also learn a fair bit about Krampus as portrayed in this story. While Santa’s job is to reward nice people with presents (or coal if they’re not so nice), Krampus goes out to punish the naughty, though sometimes he goes too far with his punishments. Also, it’s said he wants to take over control of Christmas from Santa and that’s why he goes through with his plan in this story. He also has powerful magic at his disposal and can even summon creatures to do his bidding. His basic motivations are laid out and he has room in the series to grow into a threatening villain.

VISUALS

This comic has a colorful and cheerful art style, fitting seeing the holiday it draws its inspiration from. A lot of characters and parts of the setting make use of white, reds, and greens, which set in the Christmas theme nicely. The characters look vibrant and interesting with a lot of variation while still fitting in with the world of the story. Even some of the elves in Santa’s workshop have distinct looks. Settings range from the quaint snowy town of Snowville to the subterranean mushroom village of Undertown and there are creatures from soldiers made of straw to ice dragons. It wants readers to go further to explore more of this world.

FINAL THOUGHTS

NorthStars is a fun and entertaining comic that presents itself as a Christmas-themed Adventure Time style story. There is a large world to explore with interesting characters to lead you through it. While the plot isn’t that deep, there is plenty of humor and clever scenes to keep you moving through the story that will hopefully be expanded on in future issues.

SCORE: 4/5

 REREAD VALUE: MODERATE

=

What did you think of this review? Does this comic sound like something you want to check out? Make your voice heard in the comments below. Thanks for coming!

Movie Review - Monster Island

With Halloween having just gone by, monster movies were all the rage. From blockbuster horror movies to small screen fun flicks, monsters are always in when October comes around. Along with the bigger names though, there are also some lesser known projects that work their way in. One of those lower-profile projects I happened across was a 3D animated film called Monster Island. It looked interesting when I happened across it, but will others find it so?

Let’s look at Monster Island.

STORY

The movie focuses on a boy named Lucas and his father Nicolas (no last name given). They live a normal life in a regular city (also no name given), until a Halloween party where Lucas turns into a monster in front of everybody. Nicolas then reveals that he is secretly a monster too and they both come from an island of monsters called Caldera. Angry at having been kept in the dark for so long, Lucas runs away from home to find Caldera and discover his true heritage, with Nicolas following soon after to make sure his son is safe.

That’s about as much as I can explain before diving into spoilers.

The story raises a lot of questions. Why did they leave the island in the first place? What happened to Lucas’s mother? While some of the questions raised get answered, others, particularly minor ones, don’t, but they’re mostly just side details that don’t have a direct impact on the main plot. Speaking of the main plot though, once the setting shifts from the human city to Caldera, the plot takes a few different twists and turns, especially as certain characters get introduced, and this creepy comedy gets a few more action sequences thrown in. 

Looking at this story, it draws a few comparisons to some other movies, particularly Firebreather, a story about a half-human/half-kaiju (don’t think too hard on that) who has a mostly normal life as a high schooler until stuff happens and he is forced to embrace his monster side. While comparisons to other movies do show up, Monster Island isn’t as blatant or egregious about it as other movies and while a movie like Firebreather establishes quickly that it wants to be more action-focused, Monster Island gets to it later in the story, but hints at it earlier on. It wants to try more to build up the events to the main climax at the end.

CHARACTERS

At the beginning of the movie, when Lucas is still going to high school, before the ill-fated Halloween party, you see a lot of typical high school archetypes. There’s the jerk jock, the bullied nerd, the stuck-up hot girl, and Lucas is basically the everyman. As the plot continues, we see more of Lucas’s personality as he is an adventurous person who’s not afraid to take risks and doesn’t want to wait to do what he thinks he needs to do. His father Nicolas is the same way. While a lot of his motivation may have to with keeping his son safe, he also shows a bit of his own adventurous side as well over the course of the story. The other important characters in this movie, who I won’t elaborate on for spoiler reasons, fit their roles relatively well, but apart from two, none of them stand out from the roles they play.

VISUALS & AUDIO

The visuals in this movie are a bit odd. Comparing the city at the start of the movie with the island of Caldera, there are a lot of clear differences and I’m not sure if all of them are intentional. In the city, some of the buildings stand at weird angles and have weird colorations. Granted, these are buildings in the background, but it stands out when compared to a town in Caldera, where all the buildings are standing up straight. In fact, in one shot at the start of the movie, there are several buildings that seem to lean in strange angles and only two small buildings don’t, one of them being the one Lucas and Nicolas live in. I’m not sure if this was just rushed animation or a design choice to subtly show how Lucas really belongs in Caldera and not in the human city.

Speaking of Caldera, this is clearly a monster island. All the monsters on the island have a variety of different looks and attributes, with some looking like classic mythology creatures and some looking like they were inspired by movies like Monsters Inc. or The Nightmare Before Christmas. Even some of the plant life looks monstrous with some of the tropical plants looking like they have eyes, or tentacles, or mouths full of fangs. Compare this to the regular looking human characters and the city they live in at the start of the movie and you can clearly see what part of this movie the animators were really looking forward to.

As far as the audio goes, it does its job, but doesn’t really stand out. For the most part, the music isn’t that memorable, but it doesn’t pull you out of the film either. The exceptions here are when the film decides to insert a couple of pop songs into a couple of different scenes. They’re okay songs on their own, but here, they feel out of place. For the voice work, again, it does its job, but they aren’t standout performances.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Monster Island is an okay film to watch, especially around Halloween if you have young kids and you’re looking for something both monstrous and obscure. The story could definitely use some work in a few places, it could stand to fill a few plot holes, and this kind of story was done better in other movies, but the visuals and the designs on the monsters and the titular monster island are trick-or-treat eye-candy, especially if you like different kinds of creatures. It’s not the best thing out there, but it’s not the worst either.

 

FINAL SCORE: 3/5

REPLAY VALUE: MODERATELY LOW