Oculama

The first time I read these comics I genuinely had no idea which to rank higher, and if you look at my review of Moiderah's, you should know how much of a compliment that is.
This is a fun, competently put together comic, with some fun back and forth strategy and use and interplay of paneling. The ultimate judgment came, ironically, from One Seven's own characterization. He feels a lot more like a generic pop culture reference spouter than in your opponent's round, and as the focus, his internality could be on further display.
I have to emphasize, though, that these are nitpicks, that come from rereads and a comparison against a round with a lot of pure hype.

Now this.
This is Peak.
The sheer hype of the "for I am Elba Lugh Child of Balor" moments and the reveal of both Elba's sheer ego and power. I also like the more nuanced take on One Seven, giving him light hearted pop culture references without him feeling like your everyday deadpool-alike. He's got nuanced opinions on the anime he watches, he's kind enough to give his friend a final breakfast despite knowing the match first.
The final scene, with him about to retreat into the shadows, and her denial of that, is utterly brutal in the best kind of way.

An excellent comic and excellent first showing to the community. The action you engaged in with this comic was fantastic and you really threw yourself into a lot of the fight choreography you were working with. The way you played with the powers of your character and your opponent's really helped elevate this to a much more exciting read. Your character interaction was also strong, giving the audience a terrific introduction to who Elba is as well as One-Seven. Elba's clearly got a personality and history to them, which hopefully will be on display more in the comic rounds.

There's a few critiques that come to mind reading the comic. It mostly comes down to the backgrounds of the comic. While the opening page had an amusing dialogue to establish camaraderie, the snaking word bubbles didn't do it as much for me. It probably could have been reduced to half or a third of the conversation and it would have come through clearly. With how few backgrounds and establishing shots happened here, it feels a crime to hide away the one that's very clear. Speaking of establishing shots, page 5's final panel is exceedingly stylish and cool - undeniably so, but it feels a bit out of nowhere when there's no real clear indicator that they were against a window or mirror to start with. While you show a little bit with the first page, it would have been nice having that reflection used throughout the fight and everything else to help showcase it more.

This was a fantastic comic - you really knocked this one out of the park. You clearly went all out with this particular battle and it shows. Whatever you do next will surely be another great read. Excellent work!

Always great to see new blood in here, so worth saying again - welcome! You have very strong posing going on with your characters. The movement they're engaging in is really exciting and bombastic - you clearly love your action and it shows here in a big way. However, there's parts that have a great wind-up to the action, but it doesn't get as much love as it should. That knife throw is really rad, but it would have been even cooler if we saw the knife striking the wall or Elba dodging it.

That leads into a larger observation, which is the spatial awareness for this comic is lacking a bit. Your readability is okay but you have far too much negative space which you end up devoting towards dialogue or nothing at all and that's a shame since your art is very pleasing to look at. Page 8 stands out a bit because each panel being the same small size when it feels like a golden opportunity to really show off the backgrounds you're working with but it's reduced in favor of the action. The way you're playing with the panels by having the characters pop out and in the frame is excellent, but it ends up losing some of the punch when all that negative space is there as opposed to interacting with the next panel in some way or being overlaid over a previous panel.

Despite what the length and depth of the critique there, your comic was extremely fun - the fighting and action was super great to read and it felt classic in a way that is tough to understand if you've not been reading OCTs for like 20 years. You had a basic story of hunter and hunted and you played it out very well. More than anything, your growing stronger and doing better and better comics is something that is extremely exciting and hopefully whatever you do next will be even better than this one - which was already a great read. Super work!

What an absolute BLAST of a comic. Just a ton of fun to read.
I thought your set up was really nice,lots of great action, your panels and layouts were really creative and worked very well and I just really like how you did this color palette, very atmospheric and complemented the scenes very well. I really liked how you used her powers on page five on the final panel. Looked really slick. I thought how you portrayed their friend ship leading to their forced demise was a juicy, tension inducing choice.

Crit wise, the thing that pops up for me most is just on page 7, panels 4 and 5. It took me a moment to register she was gearing up to punch him, I couldn't quite make out that was what was happening. I think just some adjustment there. Like zooming the scene out just a bit in both. Showing more of a full body wind up in page 4, and a bit more shape on the hand and showing one-sevens torso a bit more in panel 5 I think would help.

Overall, really lovely work.lots of fun, I enjoyed it quite a bit. Thank you so much for the comic!

A very fun action packed read! Great start to the tournament!
I enjoyed your backgrounds, sense of pacing and clever use of the environment you put the characters in. I enjoyed how you used the ceiling glass breaking on page two and three with your opponents powers! Really slick use of the heat bouncing off the glass shards.

My only critique related feedback really I think might be more of my own personal preference, so take it with a grain of salt, I felt the ending and execution of your opponents character felt a little anti-climatic after all of that action packed build up. But it was a real fun use of his powers and showcased them effectively.

But honestly, really solid work, it was a real strong start for One-Seven.I look forward to more! Thank you for the comic!

Whatta first page. The volume of dialogue right out the gate was gutsy, on top of trusting the reader to follow the follow of conversation and not get lost, but I think you succeeded. I am here for Elba's smile. This character packs such a first impression, and I'm here for it. Then again you have a penchant for making characters that command attention- whether for good or evil. XD Starting off a throwdown with an explosively hot coffee was pretty inspired and a humble precursor to some of the best combat action I've seen yet. You have such a good eye for cinematic angles and poses with the violence you're trying to portray. And the way you fit it in to economize your page space is something I'd personally love to see as a tutorial to share with the masses.

First of all- welcome! Seeing a new artist and character swaggering into a death tournament is one helluva first impression. I also think your respective assassins character design is a great split of 'realistic' and superhuman. If I saw One- Seven on the shelves of my local comic shop, I would not be surprised. This first round and your rounds contents are no exception. You know how to showcase characters and just make them look cool. Your coloring and paneling gives off more of a storyboard vibe than comics, which is pretty interesting. To say nothing of your coloring which feels like it was pulled out of an episode of Batman the animated series.
If I had one note is that I'd give your comic script a run through to your dialogue before you commit it to paper. A GREAT note I got rom a fellow comic artist was to 'radio play' the dialogue of characters to hear how it sounds out loud. I think alot of the 'I'm thinking out loud and speaking to no one' moments in your comic just didn't feel like a natural. I understand your reasoning for it and how it furthers the story, but comics are a visual medium- I'd recommend challenging yourself to SHOW that instead of saying it.
Still, delighted with your comic and definitely hope to see more.

I like how you get creative with a lot of the paneling, the characters bursting out of frames and such really enhances the action! I also think you do a good job of making Elba a really intimidating threat. I really like how there's a strong sense of place with all the backgrounds, and it's very easy to follow what's happening at all times. The color also looks nice! I think I would like to see a little more variation with the shape/size of panels? It's not bad, I just think getting a little weirder with layout in some places could give you cool results.
You do a good job of writing a lot of cool moments for both characters, and it always feels like either one could have the advantage at any moment. I notice you have your character narrate what they're doing a lot. Your art/the action is really clear already, and the self narration kind of slows the action down. I do like the dialogue between the characters, it's very snappy and pretty funny! It might also have been a good idea to foreshadow (hehe) how the shadow shot works earlier, so the ending wouldn't need explanation and would maybe have more impact? Lots of good creative uses of powers throughout the comic!

Lovely coloring as always! I especially like how you use color to show off heat. I think the way Elba defeats One-Seven using gravity and light is clever, and the use of the environment in that sequence is really good. Really nasty without having to show too much gore. In the first fight sequence I had a little trouble figuring out how the glass was moving in relation to the characters- At the end of page four it looks like One-Seven is out of the way of the window, but then the glass shatters towards him? The pacing when One-Seven runs away is also a little weird, I was a little unsure if he was teleporting to the sniper's nest or running there. Cutting back and forth between the characters might help to show how much time was passing? I liked the close quarters combat and how unpleasant and meaty it felt, and I like that both characters get really fucked up from it. Lots of good facial expressions through the whole comic!
I think with the conversation at the start, it's a mistake to have so much uninterrupted text right when you want to be hooking the reader in. You might also want to show what the characters look like right at the start, so the reader has a strong mental image of the characters as they're speaking instead of just text. I do like how specific you get about the anime, little details like that add a lot of character and make it feel more natural and real! Having the characters be old friends instead of just encountering each other is also fun.

What I most appreciate here is the visual storytelling. We get a brief rundown of the characters' abilities at the start and there's no need for further exposition on that front. Shooting Elba's shadow, shattering the glass to break up the shadow, teleporting via darkness, scattering the final shadow to cause an abrupt and unpleasant meeting with the ground; the reader can intuit the mechanics they utilized without need for further elaboration.

The characterization was great as well. One-Seven is incredibly charming and Elba's arrogance not quite masking what's underneath makes for a compelling character.

As for the art, banger as usual. Tight where it needs to be, loose where it can be.

Props for managing 18 colored, shaded pages with backgrounds. Solid, easy-to-follow choreography with strong overall execution made for a brisk, entertaining read.

As much as I enjoyed the flow of action, I think you went a bit overboard on exposition. Both Elba and One-Seven did a ton of expositing, not all of which was necessary. Take the maintenance closet; we can tell Elba's burning the door down without One-Seven narrating it.

Or, say, the final page. You visually conveyed the information we needed to know (bullet to the shadow = bullet to the body), making One-Seven's narration redundant. It's not *bad* writing, but trust your ability to convey information through visuals alone. It'll make for a smoother and more organic read.

What a visceral death!

I love your art style as always. Beautiful paneling and colours all the way through. You play with light and dark as effectively as the characters as the comic goes on.

The introduction gives us fun insight into the characters' friendship and inevitable escalation into murdering each. Their fighting styles match their personalities and you show it off so well.

My favourite part is when she turns to face him after the sniper shot. Such a good series of panels.

You have some really cool panels and beautiful artwork, but the layout of those panels feels a little disorganized at times.

There are fun character moments, like when elba decides to take the elevator, and you do a good job conveying their personalities through their combat styles just like your opponent, but I would have liked to have seen a little more establishment of why the fight is happening.

Overall I would say my favourite part is page eleven's first panel. I love how Elba looks walking out of the explosion.

That was a crazy fight! Elba is quite the character, she owns every panel she's in and she knows it. This was an impressive showcase of both Elba's and One-Seven's abilities though I would've liked to have seen it be a little less one sided. I really liked the colors and the contrast you made between the two characters, making feel like a real battle between light and dark I hadn't even considered that before seeing your battle! I especially loved the death on your side, it's an interesting look into a potential cautionary tale for Elba in relying too much on your abilities.

A pretty straightforward battle but I loved it all the same! While initially there wasn't much that hade me interested in One-Seven I did end up really enjoying his banter with Elba. The battle was well done and I always enjoy a good action packed chase sequence! There were a few times (Page 8 and 14 come to mind) Where thrown projectiles don't leave the desired impact due to both lack of sound effects and a confusing layout. Overall though the comic was an enjoyable read and I did read it multiple times!

I greatly enjoyed the open and the nice lighthearted banter and the morning color palette really are quite beautiful your different perspectives and coupled with the soft line work makes for an excellent environment for the setting as well as the action panels for both of the combatants. your establishment of the two before the main action start for me lends an excellent stakes for two trained killers that I don't think is repeated anywhere in this round and makes for a really good friends having to take each other out dynamic that lends really well to how both of them getting to show off the upper limits of their abilities while giving both of them a great reason two know how to counter each other that doesn't come off as meta, to move onto the fight itself I think per usual you have a really great grasp of how to show off powers and combat! I was really cool to see them subtle tear through the city block to take each other out! you showed of both of their skill sets amazingly well and I was hungry for more the whole time. The death was a great finish as well with the gruesome meat puddle 17 made

like your opponent you went all out showing off both the intimidating aura of Elba while showing off the great cunning and resourcefulness of 17! I love when a character has to work to outsmart an overpoweringly strong threat with a good strategy and this was no different! I think the only real thing to critique is that the two didnt really have much banter overall but the action still carried the comic as a whole along with your very cool artstyle lending itself well to how both characters work either way the shadow shot to the head kill was amazing and I can see why you worked backwards from that idea. I think with that being said a little bit more of a setup for next round would have been a nice add on but again not needed! wonderfull comic