Crysalis – Chapter One: The Mushroom
By Claudia Rinofner
Review by Stephanie Cooke
I want to jump right into talking about Crysalis which I devoured on my commute to work today. I couldn’t wait to write something up and tell everyone about this amazing book that I just read, which I suppose spoils the VERDICT here… cause guess what? I really loved this story.
The first chapter of Crysalis is the first of a planned 5-issue series “about a young girl named Cricket and her strange companion, the Beast, who are on a roadtrip on a dying planet. During her journey, Cricket will learn more about the mysterious crystal plague that envelops the planet, and come to terms with her past and relationship to her sister.”
Again, I really loved this and the story captured me right off the bat with the alien world and how Rinofner chooses to portray it with purple skies and pink clouds etc. If you’ve read anything like Scott Westerfeld’s Spill Zone, you may find the art comparable to Alex Puvilland’s although Rinofner’s art is completely her own here. It’s unique and stunning with thin, intricate lines paired with bold colours that help set the tone for the story that takes place on a colonized world gone wrong.
So much emotion was evoked right off the bat with the simplest of things such as Cricket showing us a photo of her and her sister that simply said “I’m sorry” on it. With Cricket traveling alone (save for the companionship of the Beast), you know that there’s a tragic story to be told in what happened to her sister. The Beast, her animal companion that acted as her protector as well as her friend, made me think of animal familiar relationships such as Lyra and Pan’s in The Golden Compass, which is a big thing for me. Growing up, nothing got to me quite like Lyra and Pan and what they endure to save their friends and subsequently, the world. There’s a moment within The Golden Compass that tears me up even now just to think of it and that is the kind of emotional connection I feel like is being built between Cricket and the Beast in Crysalis.
I felt such strong ties to everything in this story, and even though it’s not thoroughly explored within the first issue, the subtle backdrop of humanity arriving on a new world only to colonize a dying planet is beautifully tragic and had me emotional.
Crysalis deserves to be published by the likes of Nobrow, Fantagraphics, or another prestigious small press publisher. I have no doubt in my mind that Rinofner has a long and successful career ahead of her with this being one of her first works. Storytelling and worldbuilding are things that creators struggle with regularly throughout their careers and Rinofner has told a story that in one issue has wholeheartedly captured me in every way. It’s hard not to suffer from “First Issueitis” when trying to show your audience a fictional world and new characters as well as backstory but this was flawless and left me wanting more.
Verdict:
Buy it! Crysalis is available on GumRoad where you can pay 2,99€ (about $3.50 USD) or pay what you can for 22 pages of one of the most stunning self published indie comics that I have ever seen.
