Ruthven: Citizen Investigator #1 Review: Average, At Best

Being part of gang activity is always scary business. There is a high chance of being arrested or finding yourself at the bottom of the ocean or worse. What if there’s a bigger plot to what’s going in the gang? That is what Q&Q Bowman tried to do in “Ruthven: Citizen Investigator” and the first issue makes you want to be at the bottom of the ocean with cement shoes.

In the distant future city-state of Casino, Maria Topka gets in over her head when she gets involved with a local gang. She is saved by James Ruthven, a citizen investigator who puts himself and Maria into a plot much bigger than what they expected.

While the plot is decent enough, the writing is atrocious. The characters have zero personality and all act like generic comic book characters. Good thing there’s a character guide because that’s the only way to know who’s who because the writing does a terrible job of letting you who these characters are.

The dialogue is the absolute worst part of the writing. It is bland, emotionless, lacks focus and amateurish. There is also an overuse of underlined words, sighs and sobs. The underlined words are weird because usually emphasized words are bold and italicized, not underlined. The sound effects look like they belong in an episode of the 1960s “Batman” TV show than a serious SciFi story.

There are a lot of negative things to say about the art as well. It looks like a “Sega CD” game where the actors are in front of a green screen and the resolution is toned down. Not to mention that the characters look absolutely lifeless in every panel. There’s also this weird obsession with lens flare in almost every panel that’ll make even the king of lens flare JJ Abrams think it’s overkill. Also, there are times where it looks like this comic was made in “Photoshop.”

“Ruthven: Citizen Investigator” has horrible writing and art. There are no redeeming qualities to this comic and it’s best left at the bottom of the bargain bin.