Indie Comics Review: Holli Hoxxx, Volume 2

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Adam Tinius, Austin Tinius, Bogus Books, glenn fabry, gravity, Holli Hoxxx, ignacio vega, Indie Comics

In 2012, the first volume of Holli Hoxxx rocked our world with a compelling story of an Earth without gravity. (Read our Review of Volume One.) Workers constructing new machines to restore gravity accidentally dug up the body of protagonist Holli, who suddenly came to life and wandered off. Volume One revealed her as an android, a former spokesmodel for the company selling gravity boots that keep people from floating off into space. But, the events leading to her entombment, and the motivations of the twisted characters she met, remained mysterious.

Volume Two arrived recently to both carry the story forward and open a window into the strange chain of events that created this world without gravity. Authors Austin and Adam Tinius turn the tables on the reader by showing unexpected facets of the characters’ pasts. The gruff and seemingly evil business tycoon of Volume One becomes a sympathetic character as we come to understand his complete role in events. On the other hand, the man Holli holds dear to her heart stands revealed as the source of everyone’s problems, despite his good intentions.

These “reveals” do more than provide a gripping story. They remind us how easy it is to judge people based on limited information and incomplete knowledge. How differently might we see people if we took the time to understand what brought them to their present state? If the old saw about walking a mile in a man’s shoes is true, then Holli Hoxx asks us to walk a mile in their gravity boots, too.

Stefano Cardoselli impressed us with his creative use of ink and watercolors in the art of Volume One. Ignacio Vega steps up in Volume Two with a similar approach, pushing the envelope of what we expect from comic book art in his own unique style of inks and color washes. This volume also features a cover by Glenn Fabry, the artist who gave us such memorable covers to Preacher.

We did get a little confused about the identity of two of the female characters. Like Vertigo’s 100 Bullets, Holli Hoxxx relies almost entirely on dialogue instead of captions. This requires a bit more attention and deduction on the reader’s part than your standard comic book fare, but therein lies part of this book’s appeal. And, when the captions do arrive in the second part of the story, their earlier absence makes them all the more powerful and poetic.

Austin of Bogus Books tells us Volume Three will come out in Spring of 2014, and we greatly look forward to the next chapter in this thought-provoking story. We recommend heading over to the Bogus Books website to purchase the first two volumes now. If you need a unique holiday gift for the comic book lover in your life, pick them up a copy, too!

Now in print as the Holli Hoxxx Omnibus from Bogus Books.

Indie Comics Review: Holli Hoxxx, Volume One

Tags

Adam Tinius, Austin Tinius, Bogus Books, Holli Hoxxx, Indie Comics, Stefano Cardoselli

What if there were no longer gravity on Earth? This unusual scenario gives birth to the finest Indie Comic we’ve had the pleasure to review in our two years here on Mars: Holli Hoxxx: Volume One from BogusBooks. With original science-fiction themes and gorgeously rendered ink and watercolor art, Holli Hoxxx takes you into a unique vision of the future full of twists and turns.

Competing companies sell solutions to the lack of gravity such as gravity boots and localized gravity inducers for home or business. Still, the pervasive problem remains unsolved. A massive effort begins to bury a series of giant gravity inducers that will restore the pull of earth to the city of New York, including its massively destroyed and floating burrough of Manhattan. Workers on this project uncover the apparently dead body of a beautiful woman who soon mysteriously disappears.

This woman, our protagonist Holli Hoxxx, finds herself awake thirty years into a gravity-less future with no idea how she got there. A former spokesmodel for one of the gravity boot companies, she begins an investigation to find answers, starting with the whereabouts of her former boyfriend. Shady businessmen and sleazy urban characters populate Holli’s new world, and she seems safe nowhere.

Writers Austin and Adam Tinius spend little time on explanation and exposition, focusing instead on Holli’s story told both in current time and flashback. Therefore, the reader finds themselves almost as lost as Holli at the start, and joins the investigation in putting together the pieces. Yet the farther one goes into Holli’s story, the more one becomes drawn into the world. We found we could not put the book down until we finished the entire thing.

Artist Stefano Cardoselli deserves applause for his stylized watercolor and ink art that uniquely represent Tinius’ vision. It ranks up there with the best of Heavy Metal, Miller and Sienkiewicz’s Elektra: Assassin, and Kevin O’Neill’s science fiction artwork while mimicking none of them. Sample Cardoselli’s art in the four-page excerpt below!

93 pages long and sporting a Glenn Fabry cover, Holli Hoxxx rocked our world. In the complaints department we have but one: Holli Hoxxx: Volume One presents only the first third of the story, and we were dying to read the rest! We eagerly look forward to Volumes Two and Three to see where Holli’s strange journey takes her.

Now in print as the Holli Hoxxx Omnibus from BogusBooks!