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Deadly Class, Vol. 1: Reagan Youth (2014)

by Rick Remender(Favorite Author)

4.17 of 5 Votes: 1

ISBN

1632150034 (ISBN13: 9781632150035)

languge

English

genre

Graphic Novels & Comics

publisher

Image Comics

review 1: A very entertaining read! Deadly Class follows our protagonist, Marcus, a bitter teenager who has a terrible past involving his parents and who lives on the streets. He gets recruited by a "league of assassins" I want to say, who extend an offer for him to join their assassin high school. This graphic novel, in terms of graphics, was stunning! The color schemes, the character designs, THE COLOR SCHEMES, were beautiful. Story-wise, it was very entertaining and I was engaged throughout the whole thing. Especially the LSD part. Especially then. You can imagine how psychedelic the graphics got at that point (or you could just buy it and read it to find out.)It was very interesting to read about the main character. About how the rough "high school" aspect of it, as the author... more implies, is a reflection of the kind of rough life he lived through and how mean kids will always be mean kids in high school. With or without the assassination element. A lot of the story and the events are derived from the authors life and reading about it and seeing it in graphic form really gives it life. Believability even.
review 2: So if you haven't heard yet, Deadly Class is a book set in the 1980's about a group of teenage killers at a school for the deadly arts. I have heard a lot of people singing this book's praises and while at the Image table at Thought Bubble, when I asked what I should be reading, several people came over just to say i had to pick up this book. Well with praise like that I really don't know where to start as I had very mixed feelings about this one. So let's begin with the things I loved.The colours are what sold this to me on the day. Being set in the 80's, the creative team has made a real effort to visually capture the era and boy, do they manage it. The art style and dynamic panel layouts are brought to life by some of the best colours I have seen. Using block colours and different pallets, contrast is used to not only enhance the art but to assist in the story telling. It is amazing and has changed how I view colour in comics. I am so glad that the colourist is receiving full recognition for his work. It is really exciting to see colourists and letterers being recognized more and more at the moment.So if the setting and the art are so on point where did it fall down? Unfortunately it was let down by characters I felt very disconnected from and a sparse erratic plot. It is about disillusioned teenagers but i found the protagonist unlikable and distant and the other characters lacked depth. It all felt too disjointed. I could have also played with the political climate of the time a lot more than just some references to Reagan. It was also sold on the promise of a high school which only appeared in one chapter. It's disappointing as I feel like this should have been like a cross between Kill Your Boyfriend and The Invisibles but it really misses the mark.My final verdict is that it captured the setting and the visual team are great, I just wish it was being written by Grant Morrison. less

Download links for: Deadly Class, Vol. 1: Reagan Youth

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