This post is more to remind myself of what I read and how I felt about it. Maybe even looking at a certain point in my life. I won’t be tagging creators or companies. Anyways, I tried two graphic novels this weekend and was left disappointed. Both of them are possibly because they weren’t what I expected them to be. That doesn’t mean they’re bad or that other people won’t like them. However, neither were what I was not only expecting but what I wanted.

Helm Greycastle sounds amazing. Mexican Aztec mythology in a Dungeons and Dragons type campaign. This sounds like an entire world and a concept that should be marketed to the moon. Figures, clothing, an epic TV show. I’ve never played D&D or really anything like that but I was excited to see such a under used and under represented concept on the page. Yet, and this may be on me, because I have never done RPGs I only made it a few pages into the book. This felt like a world I’m alien to. Not the world of the Aztecs, but the gaming world. Coincidentally, I tried reading this on the same day I was hearing about Critical Role, which I’ve also never tried out. This is a huge gap in my geek knowledge. Not that any of us can do and enjoy everything geeky out there. I have respect for it, but it has always missed me. I think I need some sort of guide to this world and maybe I’ll try Helm Greycastle again in the future.

FTL, Y’All sounded amazing. In this comic anthology everyone takes one deceptively simple concept and tells their story. One day plans were leaked on the internet to build a faster than light engine for $200 worth of easily accessible parts. What a concept! There are so many stories that could be told from this idea. Stories from day one, or from decades later. Stories close to Earth or far away. I was creating my own ideas as well. Instead, all but a couple stories really embraced the idea and told a story that couldn’t be told otherwise. So many other stories in the book could have been told in the real world. Or they were tales from the stars that would work in any sci-fi tale. In short, they weren’t stories that needed this hook to be told. Some stories really stuck to that concept and those were the most fun in the book. To give an overly simple explanation, if you’re reading a book full of short stories about horses and the whole book is about cowboys who ride a horse into town, that’s not about horses! The whole book left me lacking but I’m the type of blogger who wants to write every where I can, including anthologies accepting submissions. Stories I hope some editor chooses because I stayed within the guidelines. While the book wasn’t what I wanted, there were still fun stories in here. They just belonged somewhere else. I will take this as a lesson to work on my own stories and keep within the parameters of the assignment.