It's Graphic Time! The Woods Vol. 1: The Arrow by James Tynion IV

It's Graphic Time is a feature where we review graphic novels and comic books.

Title: The Arrow

Author: James Tynion IV
Illustrator: Michael Dialynas

Publisher: BOOM! Studios

Publishing Date: September 23rd, 2014

Pages: 128 
Genre: Sci-Fi Graphic Novel

TW: Death of teens

Series: The Woods Vol. 1

Source: Book

 

On October 16, 2013, 437 students, 52 teachers, and 24 additional staff from Bay Point Preparatory High School in suburban Milwaukee, WI vanished without a trace. Countless light years away, far outside the bounds of the charted universe, 513 people find themselves in the middle of an ancient, primordial wilderness. Where are they? Why are they there? The answers will prove stranger than anyone could possibly imagine.

What made me pick this book up: 

The cover of course. Look at those colors! It's beautiful, and looks... Adventurous? I guess. Like let's go on an adventure!

What made me read this book: 

The story sounded amazing. A whole school being transported to an alien planet!?! What!?! That sounds insane.

Would I read the rest of the series/more from this author?
Yeah absolutely! I even found a few other ones by this author that I want to read. Especially:

I love the artwork mostly because of the colors. It all has an underlying blue and purple color. It makes it look whimsical and very fantasy like. 

I also love the alien creatures and the scenes in this book. Absolutely beautiful.

Most of the characters are great, I don't care much for Adrian or Maria. Both are huge know-it-alls and feel like they're smarter than everyone else.

I just feel kind of meh about Isaac, Sanami, and Karen. We haven't gotten to see much about them yet.

Benjamin and Calder are my two favorites. 

This one starts off with a bang. And it's a constant go go go. There really isn't any slow parts, except for when it shows some scenes in the school, after the other kids go out. I could do without those scenes because they just seem to be thrown in.





Like I said, this one sounded interesting. The idea of an entire school being transported randomly to an unknown alien planet. It's intriguing and terrifying. Why do they get transported? What's really going on?

I feel like James does great in keeping this an interesting one. He makes you want to read more and more.

One complaint though, it says it's a horror and it's really not. It's more adventure, humor, sci-fi, than scary. I guess the idea itself of not knowing where you are is pretty scary, but the book itself isn't.

Also this ends in yet another cliffhanger. So that kind of sucked.

This book completely sucked me in, from the first page. I can't wait to read the next one!

Prior to his first professional work, Tynion was a student of Scott Snyder's at Sarah Lawrence College. A few years later, he worked as for Vertigo as Fables editor Shelly Bond's intern. In late 2011, with DC deciding to give Batman (written by Snyder) a back up feature, Tynion was brought in by request of Snyder to script the back ups he had plotted. Tynion would later do the same with the Batman Annual #1, w
hich was also co-plotted by Snyder. Beginning in September 2012, with DC's 0 issue month for the New 52, Tynion will be writing Talon, with art by Guillem March. In early 2013 it was announced that he'd take over writing duties for Red Hood and the Outlaws in April.
Tynion is also currently one of the writers in a rotating team in the weekly Batman Eternal series.