Author: Jeff Lemire Illustrator: Dustin Nguyen

Publisher: Image Comics

Genre: Graphic Novel, Sequential Art, Sci-Fi

Release Date: September 24th 2015

Page Count: 160

Format: ARC via NetGalley

ISBN: 9781632154262

Collects Descender issues #1-6

Author | Illustrator | Book Depository | Amazon | Chapters/Indigo | Goodreads

* I received this copy of Descender through the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review *

The “Read Now” section on NetGalley is probably one of my favourite things in this world, especially when there is a bunch of new comics and graphic novels all uploaded at once. The second I see anything by Image Comics in the “Read Now” section, I automatically request and download it right away. The first thing that caught my attention about Descender was its lovely cover art. In the simplest of terms, it is beautiful. I had never heard of either the author or the illustrator before, but the fact that it was released by Image Comics and the fact that it was blurbed by Brian K. Vaughan, I knew I had to scoop this one up while I had the chance.

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Goodreads synopsis: Young Robot boy TIM-21 and his companions struggle to stay alive in a universe where all androids have been outlawed and bounty hunters lurk on every planet. Written by award-winning creator, Jeff Lemire, Descender is a rip-roaring and heart-felt cosmic odyssey. Lemire pits humanity against machine, and world against world, to create a sprawling epic. Collecting issues #1-6 of Jeff Lemire (Sweet Tooth, Trillium) and Dustin Nguyen’s (Little Gotham) critically acclaimed, bestselling new science fiction series!

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I’ve been in a real “space” mood lately. After reading up on what Descender was all about, I knew it was something I needed to read. There are already a few stories with similar plot lines to that of Descender, but while parts of it felt familiar, Descender did a good job in making its version of this story unique.

Jeff Lemire has built a wonderfully intricate world consisting of 9 core planets within the United Galactic Council. We only get to see a few of these planets within this first volume, but the ones that we do get to see were very well developed. At the end of this volume, there is a small Atlas that describes the 9 core planets which provides a great sense of what we may be able to see in future volumes!

I love the character of TIM-21, one in a series of “companion” robots that were created to keep humans company, but this is where things start to feel a bit familiar as Tim-21 has very human-like feelings and he begins to become attached to his human family and wants to be human like his “brother” Andy. Although this feels familiar, it is only a small aspect in a larger story.

We learn about Tim-21 and his human family in a series of flashbacks as TIM-21 is restoring his memory hard drives after they have been damaged. This volume of the series definitely does a great job in setting the story and getting the reader familiar with the characters and setting.

The artwork by Dustin Nguyen is beautiful and is done mostly in water colour. This provides a softer, more pastel-like tone to the imagery which is different from any comic series I had read previously. It’s beautiful to look at and suits the story perfectly.

Descender is now added to the endless list of comics published by Image Comics that I absolutely loved. I will definitely be adding a hard copy of this series to my collection as soon as possible.