Story and Artwork: Jenika Ioffreda
Contains spoilers
Vampire Free Style is a series of comic books, currently up to issue 3 and destined to be 6 issues in length. The books are a gothic fairytale in which we meet a cast of characters but our story proper surrounds Micia, a sweet black cat who can speak with the stars.
She is linked to Padroncino, a witch boy who is trying to learn how to fly (with little success) and is searching for his girlfriend who has vanished without a trace. Through the comics we see flashbacks to memories of Padroncino from Micia.
There is also Edward a man whose path keeps crossing that of Micia. When near the cat he sees a vision of a girl clad in black, surely Padroncino’s missing girlfriend. As I mentioned this is a gothic fairytale and the story ties these characters in deeply together, with hints of a history going back 300 years. The story itself is complex and interesting, though the dialogue can be a little off at times. However, this is a minor criticism and, if anything, adds a formality to the dialogue that works in the setting.
Where this really succeeds is with the illustrations, worked in black and grey they carry a cuteness within that is underscored with a sumptuousness, which merges the gothic element with a magical mischievousness. This mischievousness is complimented by story asides, such as a little clay idol that teases Micia in a magic shop. The shop, incidentally, is owned by Auntie Margherita a character whose face we never see but who has a perchance for dressing the long suffering cat in costumes – to comic effect. It is, again, the visual aspects of such impish humour that really works.
Now, to this point I have not mentioned vampires and this is the reason I have looked at these 3 issues in the form of an honourable mention. It is at the very end of the third volume that our vampiric activity begins – literally over the last three pages when Edward is reawakened as a vampire. Obviously in the fourth volume the vampire aspects will come more into play.
A beautiful trip into a dark fable, with enough story revealed and questions raised within the reader’s mind to both intrigue and bring them back into the beautifully drawn world.
The comic’s homepage is here.
Contains spoilers
Vampire Free Style is a series of comic books, currently up to issue 3 and destined to be 6 issues in length. The books are a gothic fairytale in which we meet a cast of characters but our story proper surrounds Micia, a sweet black cat who can speak with the stars.
She is linked to Padroncino, a witch boy who is trying to learn how to fly (with little success) and is searching for his girlfriend who has vanished without a trace. Through the comics we see flashbacks to memories of Padroncino from Micia.
There is also Edward a man whose path keeps crossing that of Micia. When near the cat he sees a vision of a girl clad in black, surely Padroncino’s missing girlfriend. As I mentioned this is a gothic fairytale and the story ties these characters in deeply together, with hints of a history going back 300 years. The story itself is complex and interesting, though the dialogue can be a little off at times. However, this is a minor criticism and, if anything, adds a formality to the dialogue that works in the setting.Where this really succeeds is with the illustrations, worked in black and grey they carry a cuteness within that is underscored with a sumptuousness, which merges the gothic element with a magical mischievousness. This mischievousness is complimented by story asides, such as a little clay idol that teases Micia in a magic shop. The shop, incidentally, is owned by Auntie Margherita a character whose face we never see but who has a perchance for dressing the long suffering cat in costumes – to comic effect. It is, again, the visual aspects of such impish humour that really works.
Now, to this point I have not mentioned vampires and this is the reason I have looked at these 3 issues in the form of an honourable mention. It is at the very end of the third volume that our vampiric activity begins – literally over the last three pages when Edward is reawakened as a vampire. Obviously in the fourth volume the vampire aspects will come more into play.A beautiful trip into a dark fable, with enough story revealed and questions raised within the reader’s mind to both intrigue and bring them back into the beautifully drawn world.
The comic’s homepage is here.
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