When you read the title, “Life Lessons from a UFO Catcher”, your imagination starts to go off to space and thinking about abductions, and stuff, and this might still come on this graphic novel series, but, do hold your horses, because you are in for a big surprise with this one, ahhahahaha, trust me.
This graphic novel is visually appealing, and those who are into anime and manga, will LOVE the clean visuals of the artist Yamawe. Simple, nice and kawaii. The colour scheme is soft and “happy” with light hues and soft shades, most of the time. There are dark shades both to keep focus and to show emotions, so it’s not all light and sunshine.
There is no clutter whatsoever, as the artist focused on the story and the details of the characters, which gives consistency and a good reading flow to the story.
Talking about flow, once you get used to the first frames, and acclimatize yourself with the first frames, the story is smooth sailing. You can read it and imagine the sequence of events, frame to frame, that give you an impression that you are watching an anime episode, and yes, we are talking about the funny and dramatic ones that are filled with humour and awkwardness.
It’s nice to see that the frame sequences were made in such a way that the movement can be both seen and imagined! (Allow me to explain…) Imagine a comic book. You get one frame of and then you get another frame of an action that connects to the first frame, but it’s is a little further in the future, or is another action completely but related to the first, like in fights. In this graphic novel, however, you often get 2-3 sequences of the same action in very short time intervals and that makes a complete difference in the reading experience!
When it comes to the plot and characters, I laughed at the setting of the whole story.
You have a guy that is 1000% unlucky, but he is persistent, dedicated, rash at times, but genuinely a good guy, (ok, he is a total nerd too, but there is nothing wrong with that now is it?) and this whole thing adds up on the story in an interesting way.
You see, the story (or this season of the comic series), is about Kenny, the MC, trying to rescue plushies, yes, plushies, from the “captivity” of machines (but he has to pay to do it….), but the man is on a mission, and you can’t stop him, hahahhahahahaha.
Well, sure, this is an auto bibliographical graphic novel, so it’s narrated on the first person perspective, and about the main character, Kenny Loui, but it’s not one of those auto bibliographical novels that you become tired of reading the word “I” in the first two pages, in fact, it doesn’t even feel personal, as the author only wants to pass messages of life that are useful to readers through an interesting story!
Yamawe, the artist, made a great job in the drawing of the characters, and you can notice how good she is because of the clarity of the expressions of the characters, the shadowing and light-work to enhance certain features of the face, to the point that we, the readers, can understand without words and at a first glance, how the characters is feeling, this is excellent, and the fact that the characters are drawn in a simple manner, adds to that. The details aren’t intricate, but the whole work makes it clear and effortless to read the characters’ expressions. Very well drawn.
Another thing that one has to appreciate is how the author lays messages and lessons in the narrative in the short chapters of the graphic novel. Messages of being nice to people, polite, of how to make right choices, how to treat others, apologize and how life has a lot of twists and turns but you have to keep focused on the prize and your mission that you have set for yourself even though there are many setbacks! Which is something you don’t read as often anymore, and surely do not expect from a graphic novel about UFOs, right? But here we are!
This is wholesome and super cute, and talking about super cute, I found it funny how both man and women will love this graphic novel, although having a kawaii vibe to it. It’s entertaining, and awkward (for the main character) at times, but you can feel how genuine the story is, how genuine are the characters, even the bad ones (or bad one), so this is something great to see! I mean, how many times we read the same things, and we do not venture from our comfortable zone when reading? This will provide a healthy shift in reading for many.
Yes! There is a villain. Kind of. It’s more like a rival of the MC, that has the same hobby as him, (rescuing UFO’s from the claw’s of captivity), which makes the story interesting, because, let’s face it, the “hero” always need a contrasting force so we can measure his progress, and this time it’s not different, but it’s not usual either! You see, this rival, is his rival, for no reason, and he is mysterious because doesn’t talk much.
They just dislike each other because, well, they want the same plushies (and one is luckier and the other is nicer than the other, ok, the villain is a jerk), so it’s a dynamic that has lots of potential of development and maybe we will see more on the second season of this graphic novel. Maybe the CIA will call him for the real work, who knows? This can go anywhere, hahahahahha.
A particular thing about this graphic novel novel, or that I noticed, is that, a lot of the story is told by frames. I know this sounds dumb given that it’s a graphic novel, yes, but once you read it you will notice that the characters are introduced without mentions of them, but they kind of start in the background and then come slowly to the foreground and they start to interact organically, which is something that adds to this novel in a subtle way. It’s like the author and artist give you time for you to become visually acquainted with the characters before they take direct part of the story and the plot. This happens for 3-4 frames on average, but there is one character that appears for more than that before she get’s active on the story.
This graphic novel is very well thought out, and it’s interactive too, as there are links and QR codes for you to check more content of the author and YouTube channel, so you can dive deeper into the author’s content. Cool! And one has to be warned that, although, this graphic novel is fluffy and cute, and doesn’t have anything “graphic”, the age range should be above 12, so we will leave you with that.
OK! I will not dive deeper into this cool story with amazing graphics, because you know that I do not give spoilers…, so I will wrap this up. IF you want to see some eye-candy soft graphics and laugh while reading a smooth paced graphic novel that will leave a wholesome feeling in you, then DO grab your copy, specially if you like anime, you will love this. IF you haven’t read any graphic novel before, and never thought about reading one, this is a great place to start, hahahahha. Seriously, there is no way you will dislike this, a sure, safe bet in every aspect. This is a very nice indeed. I will read this again soon, and dive deeper into graphic novels. Great stuff here.
Pros:
- Clean cut graphics
- Appealing visual color pallete
- Funny story that makes you curious
- Well put humour and messages of positivity and struggle
- Worthwhile and unpredictable plot
- Short in length and straight to the points
- Memorable and a book easy to read again
Cons:
- None.
Scribble's Worth 