‘Harry Potter’ didnt resonate with me like so many other people. By the time the fifth novel came out so many years ago, I discovered something called Gameboy SP took up most of my time. But there is a lot of imagination on the part of J.K. Rowling with what I can remember with the series. What comes with imagination my friends….is copyright infringement.

It seems that the new series by Vertigo is using ‘Harry Potter’ as a source for this new series. When I mean as a source, I mean almost balantally rip it off. Okay it’s not exactely a ripoff with the main character; but the stories that follow Tommy Taylor (the protagonist) and his entire life is practically ‘Harry Potter’….just with a few differences so Mike Carey doesnt get sued. I gotta say it was a little tough trying to get into this new world. You gotta do something to pull the readers in on a new series; especially with a first issue. I really didnt get much of that in here. There is very little characterization; I dont feel like I know anything about this Tommy Taylor except that he’s a guy who’s mooching off his father’s fame. Then all of this supernatural stuff is occuring and the ideal that Tommy might actually be apart of a fantasy setting is intriguing….but very little is shown to make me think this is the case. Sure there is this strongman vampire trying to kill him towards the end, but lose the fangs and he’s basically an insane bomber.

What I did like about this was the art. A lot of people think it’s difficult to draw huge action scenes or battles. But really I think doing art for a comic when it’s all talking heads is even harder. Peter Gross brings a lot of detail into the designs of the characters. It looks simple at first but then when he has to do a bunch of crowd/mob scenes…it’s amazing how he can think of dozens of designs for characters. Not one person looks the same but they all look average and nothing is supernatural about them at all. There are some goofs in the panels, ironically when there is action in this. It doesnt look fluid and it feels like it was drawn really messy in my eyes. The scene where that vampire dude bites the dust; I cant tell you what happened

Vertigo is usually on the money when it comes to new series. They bite the bullet sometimes on crazy ideas; but most of the titles they have had in their run have been classics. For ‘The Unwritten’ I’m not sure this is a home run like the others. The story is a bit bland and it doesnt help that it uses other sources to tell a story. (Heck I didnt even talk about how closely this could go into Fables territory) I have confidence that this series will pick up and make the readers interested in this universe. As for now, this is trade waiting for me. This wasnt a bad issue by any means, but it’s not gonna hook me in to pick it up in issues. Let’s just hope J.K. Rowling has a sense of humor and doesnt get the subpoena ready if she gets wind of this.