Love, Hate, and then there's RASL

Jeff Smith had an almost impossible task ahead of him. How does a self-publishing legend, a critical darling, and a beloved all-ages creator begin work on a new project?

Well, evidently by going for a dark atmosphere over substance and shipping once every three or four months.

Allow me to clarify: I didn't dislike RASL, but I didn't particularly like it either. It's not a bad comic by any stretch of the imagination, but I wouldn't label it excellent unless you're obliged to worship anything Smith puts out. I'm going to start with the bad, since I am a pessimist.

Three over-sized issues in, I don't understand the seemingly-central plot device. The "Drift" has not only been under-explained, but under-depicted. I struggled to make sense of the oblong shape in the sea of black ink that shows up when the titular character makes a trip through the Drift. I'm a firm believer that science-fiction needs to be handled in a variation of two ways: either the story revolves around an excellent science-based idea and plot, or you must explain away the science to focus on the story at hand. RASL doesn't really commit to either. Smith wants to tease us with small hints of the science at hand, including some clunky explanatory scenes in the third issue, but he has yet to do more than add strange element after strange element. On the flip-side, his character plots have remained almost completely intertwined with the sci-fi elements, making it difficult to connect to characters due to gaps in understanding about the way RASL's universe operates. The Native American plot and the art thief angles could be welcome, fresh elements in this sci-fi tale, but Smith hasn't made much of either yet.

Additionally, it can come across that Smith is just trying too hard not to be "the Bone guy." Carrying a "suitable for mature audiences" warning, Smith tries to darken RASL in clunky ways that don't contribute to the narrative, such as the exposed breasts of the prostitute(?) that RASL sleeps with and his strip club visit. I'm not sure that either added to my understanding of RASL, but these sort of elements might work well if not for Smith's inability to sufficiently depart from his Bone art style. While no creator should be forced to write just one type of story, the medium of comics calls for different visual styles to suit different storytelling tones. Writers have free range to work with the most suitable artists, but artists and cartoonists need to be able to adapt to different moods visually. The vagabond that RASL meets in the third issue looks ripped right from the world of Bone, to humorous effect. The eponymous character, however, spends much of his time looking like a "Yu-Gi-Oh" character with the fullest hair a woman could ever hope for. There are also scenes where his anatomy is downright bad (I defy you to explain away RASL's pose and figure on page 17 of the collected volume in any rational manner). Much of the issue stems from inconsistency; the RASL of pages 29 and 53 is not the same wasp-waisted RASL of page 38, let alone the freakishly long-armed RASL of the opening sequence.

Consistency also comes into play when you consider the slow-boil plot. Mainstream comics are in an age of decompressed storytelling, where plots and events drag out over months. This kind of slow pacing might be considered expertly done if the book had a regular shipping schedule, but publishing six issues in two years doesn't qualify the book as possessing such. I have the benefit of reading a collected volume (and I have a sneaking suspicion that the glowing major publication reviewers quoted on the back cover did as well), but I can guarantee that I would have called it quits with this title after the first hiatus. Even this collected volume feels like a Hail Mary to keep interest alive in some form, as it certainly doesn't include a full story arc of any sort.

Now Sour Steve is going to exit the blogosphere for a moment so that Sunny Steve can write a few positive notes.


RASL succeeds in several ways. As a book with an unusually large page size, RASL has the challenge of justifying its unique format. Here, Smith does a good job by allowing for wide, open panel designs. RASL is so sparsely populated by characters that the expansive panel deisgn helps to make the feeling more intentional. The desert of the first few pages wouldn't work as well if it weren't so blindingly white and open, and scenes like pg. 19's explosion benefit from the space alloted.

RASL is billed as a "sci-fi noir," and Smith makes occasional use of the noir aspect to great benefit, laying on heavy inks as on the image from pg. 18 that was swapped for the cover, or the first meeting with the lizard-like assassin pages later. Scenes like the latter also benefit from Smith's restraint with dialogue. The book features little narration, focusing instead on allowing the action to speak for itself. Often very kinetic, the layouts are never difficult to follow. I'm disappointed that this focus seems to disolve as the book goes on (compare the first struggle with the lizard man to the last), but Smith might very well strike a balance in future issues.

At the end of the day, RASL offers something very different, both from Smith's previous output and from the majority of books published each month. Its unhurried pace, intriguing (if inconsistent) visual style, striking use of black and white, and decently fresh science fiction devices, RASL might very well be looked back on fondly. Perhaps I'm just not the target audience, as I didn't grow up with the self-publishing boom and its resulting storytelling styles. The most grevious error, in my mind, is the inability to ship the product in a manner that complements the plot's decompression. This volume didn't offer me enough to want to stick around for the years it might take for the series to payoff, but I certainly think more committed fans will find aspects to enjoy.