Stay Cool is a comic written and lettered by Adriano Ariganello with art by Rafael Chrestani. A federal agency’s investigation into a corporation takes a heated turn. This is an action-filled science fiction comic with twists and turns that stars a woman who isn’t here for the run around. The leading lady here is Elanor Rose, an agent for an undisclosed federal agency who is very direct and has a temper. She has a coworker named Almeida that she is friends with and her boss Chief Collins who she has a good rapport with. The story begins with Ellie coming into the office late and getting the skinny on what she missed earlier that morning. After a couple introductions and discussions the story really kicks off. The action here is explosive and physical with a decent amount of blood and rough moments. The pace is like that of an action movie, a bit steady at first but it picks up quick. The tone is serious with intensity reaching and remaining there for the duration of the issue. Occasionally due to the structure of the text bubbles it may seem like the characters are speaking in disjointed sentences but they are not. This can make the pages seem wordier even though they aren’t. This is an exciting story with a resourceful lead that’ll have you on your toes even after it’s over.

            The artwork here is drawn with a sense of realism and has a good focus on the smaller details, which is common in comics drawn in black-and-white. The scenery here tends to be big buildings but we won’t see much of them as this story takes place primarily indoors. The main locations tend to be buildings with where you can see the grout between the tiles and the mortar between the bricks. The focus on smaller details like these give the areas a bit more life. The backgrounds don’t always have parts of these locations in them; sometimes it’ll be full of action lines or some light-dark contrast. The expression level here is above-average as the looks go hand-in-hand with the words and add extra weight to them. The emotions are all over the place from fear to rage with plenty of sinister looks in between. The faces have strongly drawn features from the top of the forehead to the chin which helps each look come across clearly. The action here is very violent from physicality to explosive with not much in the way of gore but a decent amount of blood. The violent scenes are easy to with everything flowing well.

“Is this worth reading?”

Yes.

“Would I like this?”

If you like science fiction stories taking place in our modern world starring a woman with a temper and showing plenty of violence than this is for you.

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

R. Blood, violence, death.

“Could I get a quote from the comic?”

“This isn’t a case that we can risk with your temper Rose.”

 

Physical Link: https://www.pestocomics.com/product/stay-cool-chrestani/4

Kickstarter Link: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/pestocomics/stay-cool/description

Crowdfundr Link: https://crowdfundr.com/pestocomics-store?ref=ab_8njgBR3yrih8njgBR3yrih

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

Probably Contains Spoilers

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Actual Pages(not counting covers and credits): 24

Violent Pages: 8, for 33% 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 – 3

“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 – 3

“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.”