A Graphic Novel by Joe Corallo
It’s been a while since I started reading Becstar by Joe Corallo, but I will be honest with you – I nearly did not finish this book. It’s not that it’s a bad book, it’s just that sometimes comics come around that just don’t do it for you and this was definitely one of them for me. So, what exactly happened?
“Becstar is a star hopping mercenary-gone-full time-gambler light years away from Earth. Leaving her old life behind with the help of her magical luck dagger and her fan-turned-regret filled-friend Sally Soolin, Becstar ekes out a living under the nefarious Shadow Syndicate’s radar. But when a mysterious girl appears with grim news and an urgent quest where the fate of the universe hangs in the balance, Becstar has no choice but to join… and regret it immediately.”
Becstar was somewhat of a mixed bag for me, thus why it has taken me song long to actually complete my review of this book. The premise and artwork in this book are promising, but the storyline somewhat falls flat at about halfway through. What starts out as a solid science fiction space opera turns almost into a farce with nearly every character bickering the entire time in lieu of a lot of actual character development. There is one easy way to immediately turn me off of a story, and bickering characters is quite possibly the fastest. I felt the same way with a critically acclaimed book called Nothing But Blackened Teeth, wherein the entire cast argued and fought the entire time – I hated it, but here it just made a promising book mediocre.
To be honest, I want the story that is alluded to at the beginning of this book and the flashbacks within, instead we trade badass mercenary Becstar for bumbling nigh unlikable Becstar that seems to be completely at odds with her reputation. The only thing keeping me from a total burial is the artwork which is awesome. It’s an interesting style and uses an atypical color palette of rich pastels and bright colors. When most space operas opt for varying shades of brown, especially after the show Firefly and Battlestar Galactica made everyone feel that leather jackets were the official space uniform. Hats off to Joe Corallo for being different.
While not wholly irredeemable, this comic was a letdown for me in many ways. The characters were not very likeable, the story meandered a lot, and overall, I felt like the ending was not all that great. I don’t like doing negative reviews on here, but I promised to give an honest review, and here I am begrudgingly doing my best to meet that. This comic DOES have a great cast of strong female characters, and I’m sure it can find an audience with somebody, sadly it was not with me.
If you are interested in this book, click HERE
NOTE: I received a free preliminary, and likely unedited copy of this book from Netgalley for the purposes of providing an honest, unbiased review of the material. Thank you to all involved.