Intrusive Thoughts #1 is comic put together by Anthony Stokes, D.N.S., and Mira Mortal. A teenage boy attempts to prepare for college but he is plagued by nightmares that might be real. This is a supernatural horror comic with a dark atmosphere that can get a bit trippy. The main man for this comic is Tyler, he is a foster kid skilled at art with parents who don’t care much about and basically no friends. He also has faded memories of his real parents. A few other prominent characters are Tyler’s therapist and an unnamed kid from school. The story begins with Tyler giving us an account of his life up to this point. We get a flashback to earlier in the week and watch as he goes through a daily routine filled with nightmares and hallucinations that may or may not be real. The action here is physical and bloody with some slightly heavy gore. The pacing is somewhat steady as you might get confused at some points. The tone is dark and a bit depressing with psychologically intense moments. Besides some opening narration most of the dialogue is spoken aloud and conversational. There are no word heavy pages here. This is a debut comic with a gloomy, depressed lead who is attempting to navigate a situation that threatens to pull him down further.

            The art here looks like a smoother and cleaner version of the art you might see in the 80’s and 90’s. The majority of the colors tend to lean towards the darker end and there is significant and purposeful shading. Tyler lives near a wooded area so for scenery we get different types of trees and some grass. The location changes frequently from Tyler’s home to his therapist’s office, to the school, and to the street he lives on. The backgrounds are constantly shifting from showing the scene, being a gradient color, and being pitch black. The expression level here is around average as Tyler does react to what’s going on around him but he usually maintains a look of resignation. His main emotions are of sadness and depression with fear coming in third. The faces are decently drawn and you should be able to decipher the different expressions. Some of the supernatural creatures here will look familiar. The violence here has hand-to-hand combat along with some gruesome, gory attacks. The action scenes but due to the slight trippiness you might get thrown off a bit but it won’t be hard to get back on track.

“Is this worth reading?”

Yes, if this is up your alley.

“Would I like this?”

If you like supernatural horror starring a depressed black teen who is having trouble knowing what’s real and what isn’t then this is for you.

“What would this comic’s film rating be?”

R. Violence, gore.

“Could I get a quote from the comic?”

“Please make it stop.”

 

Kickstarter Link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/decay/intrusive-thoughts-issue-1/description

***IN-DEPTH COMIC STATS BELOW***

Probably Contains Spoilers

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Actual Pages(not counting covers and credits): 28

Violent Pages: 7, for 25% of the comic

Sexy Pages: 0, for 0% of the comic

 

**The levels below aren’t necessarily maintained throughout the whole comic, but they were definitely reached**

 

Violence Level – 3

“Wasn’t no tussling at all.”

“Sometimes you gotta hit somebody.”

“I’m getting charged with how many counts of assault?”

“This was a tournament arc.”

“All my life I had to fight.”

 

Gore Level – 5

“The only thing leaking out your face is tears.”

“Looks like somebody spilled some ketchup.”

“Might need to soak that up with a bath towel.”

“That isn’t supposed to be outside the body.”

“This is a slaughterhouse.”

 

Death Level – 2

“And everybody lived happily ever after.”

“We might have gone to a couple funerals.”

“It just LOOKS like a serial killer was here.”

“Yeah this was a tragedy.”

“Think Gettysburg.”

 

Porn Level – 1

“Everybody kept their clothes on.”

“I guess it was too hot for a bra.”

“Sometimes you got to let everything air out.”

“This is like late night Cinemax in the early 2000’s.”

“Oh. This is porn.”