4 out of 5

I don’t know if this is how the series will be collected, but an earlier edition of trades split at issue four, and story-wise, it seems like a fair stopping point.

So: it’s completely acceptable to take the mindset that any given story, in any format, should entertain (assuming that’s one of its goals), and that if it doesn’t satisfy that main component, toss it away.  (We’ll skip my aside where I mutter about how any mindset is completely acceptable, as well as the aside that points out that this is an aside.)  But I do think that any given story can benefit from some context, or help to clarify some muddled feelings one might have.  With LFG, knowing that it was a webcomic – and knowing that it has quite a history, and that Dynamite is re-presenting it here – definitely made the appearance and pacing more acceptable.  The page-by-page setups; the cramped paneling; the very digital coloring and lettering: once you get the limitations of its presentation, you can settle in for the story.

Though I would like to say that I was enjoying it prior to discovering that, and if the letters pages hadn’t sounded like they were from a waaay older comic, maybe I wouldn’t have discovered it until later.

Thus, maybe going back to my original statement – LFG entertained, despite its format.  And then knowing more made me dig it more.

Starting out as something of a WoW spoof, LFG quickly (as in by page 3 or 4) expanded beyond this, banding together Dark Wizard Richard, priestess Benny, brawler and poet and cow Krunch, and eager and honorable elf Cale on quest to retrieve The Sword of Truth, to put to rest some fuss in Benny’s past.  Lar Desouza packs an amazing amount of characterization onto the page, summarizing huge action in tiny panels and helping what quickly becomes a complex script from feeling too bogged down by keeping the visuals light and moving, while not sacrificing the dribblings of emotions which start to sneak in.  Ed Ryzowski’s colors have that webcomic shine and blend, but the overall design – credited to Aurelie Martin, though I don’t know if that’s for the comic or how it looked online, but nonetheless – makes it work with a simple tracks of using black panel gaps instead of white ones.  Something about this negative space helps ground the colors, as does the way Desouza and Ryzowski seem to work together for a good balance of detailing handled by one or the other.

The story required some flipping back and forth for me, as small details – one line, one panel – are pretty important, but this doesn’t feel like poor writing, especially for the format.  If anything, it just adds to the rewarding experience, realizing that you’re reading a full-on story and not just a gag strip, and the lack of telegraphing things too clearly – and yet, making it seem like developments are organic, and not out of left field – is far and away from the hand-holding of most publishers, and indeed, a lot of major RPGs / MMORPGs.  Of which I’m not a huge player, so being part of that club is not a prerequisite here.  Yes, most of the humor stems from kill-happy Richard, but I found I was just as eager to read any of the character’s scenes, another clear sign that Sohmer is doing something right.  Although, overall, given how many foes our team conquers issue by issue, the Sword of Truth pursuance feels a little McGuffin, but I look forward to Aelloon, Benny’s pursuant, being further established as a threat, or for that storyline to be rolled into something bigger.  Either way, I’ll definitely be there, very excited to see that there’s years of material left to print.

As a bonus to re-readers, LFG includes some extra strips (NPC and Tiny Dick Adventures – two spin-offs that, at least in the former case, absolutely add to the LFG world) and have apparently touched up the main strip itself a bit.