Beware Spoilers Ahead!

My reviews do contain spoilers about the main stories but I do attempt to keep them at a minimum. I will not reveal any major plot points or twists unless stated at the beginning of a review.

Sunday 14 August 2016

The Local Pocket #6 - Nevermorrow

I was lucky enough to get a sneak preview at the unfinished, let alone published, Never Morrow. Never Morrow is written and illustrated by Chris McQuinlan and self published through Kickstarter. There are still a few days left on the Kickstarter so if you hurry there is still time to pledge for your own copy for as little as $3.

Never Morrow begins with the crew of a spaceship waking up after time in cryosleep as their ship approaches a previously undiscovered planet. As the crew take their positions, the ship's landing gear fails causing it to crash land on this new uncharted planet. As the dust settles the only survivor is Professor Mannix and the ships A.I. Ozma. With few options Professor Mannix leaves the ship with Ozma and searches the plant for intelligent life that may be able to help. It doesn't take long for Professor Mannix to realise that something is very wrong on this peculiar planet.

The copy that I was given the chance to read did not have the completed art so I will be making my assessment of the art by the promotional material and panels already released. The design of the ship is very different from the standard sleek and streamline spaceship and has a boxier look, that I can only describe as a flying USB, and is a much more interesting design than the standard sleek "sports model" style space ships that is so common. The design of the Ozma drone is essentially just a floating camera with fins but is still adorable and somehow manages to give the little A.I. computer heaps of personality.

Never Morrow is focused entirely on professor Mannix who is full of a mixture of wonder and apprehension about the uncharted planet. As I was reading I originally found it very strange that Professor Mannix decided to leave the ship immediately after the crash landing, paying no attention to the bodies of the unfortunate crew. But as Mannix traverses the terrain the professor is struck with a sudden realisation that everyone else is dead and the only one left is the A.I. Ozma. After reading the moment where Mannix has the sudden realisation of the true gravity of the situation made me think that leaving the ship immediately and ignoring dead is similar to how a person in shock would react and gave Professor Mannix a huge amount of depth very quickly.
Professor Mannix

Being familiar with Chris' other work Never Morrow is very different from what I expected which is no way a criticism. I really enjoyed Never Morrow and I can't wait to see it all put together, polished and finished.

It is very difficult to give a rating to an unfinished comic so from what I've seen so far I give Never Morrow 4 out of 5 Ozma drones

Find out more about Never Morrow here and pledge on Kickstarter here.
See more of Chris McQuinlan's work here.