5 out of 5

Yet another madly interesting indie book that will probably never have a follow-up, Owlgirls found its starting place via the (I think) crowd-sourced Red Anvil publisher, who tease me by putting a preview for issue #2 in the back of this book and having a contact form on their website to which they don’t, apparently, respond.  Woop woop.  But ignore that in favor of my praise of the comic…  Which is a total oddball old-timey New York tale about three sisters who are… owls… and live above a Soho mortuary… and occasionally flit around the city (while masked) to do good deeds… and communicate with their spiritual mother who walks on two sticks and warns them of impending danger…  And yet, this is all presented without cheek by writer Sodaro, who’s prolific as hell as an editor / writer in the underground and I hope to track down something else by him to see if it holds the same charm.  The art, by Rachele Aragno and Red Anvil co publisher Dave Ryan (I’ll assume he helps with backgrounds, which have some interesting photo-stat effects) is amazing, gray tones capturing the 40s-ish vibe perfectly and Aragno’s figures drawn with an expressive stateliness that balances the odd premise.

I’ve read the issue a handful of times, and it’s fun on each go ’round.  Aragno has a website and Sodaro keeps working on other things, but maybe one day Kickstarter (which produced this issue…?) will bring us a #2.