Everything in this world looks diseased or poisonous, but it's fun to look at and richly detailed. This goes way beyond the 'grimdark' genre in many ways, but it's got an easy, lightly satirical humor that keeps it far from bleak.

Honestly, 'Orc Stain' could've sucked as a story - I think I expected it to suck - so I was surprised to find myself loving Stokoe's nasty little fantasy about a world ruled by Orcs. With that many ingredients, the stylistic influences coalesce and disappear, becoming something new.Įqually dangerous awesomeness from James Stokoe: There was still a Graham influence, but it was just one ingredient in a concoction that includes Paul Pope, Nathan Fox, Geof Darrow, Moebius, Taiyo Matsumoto, Dave Cooper, and Farel Dalrymple. His early work in Won Ton Soup bears a strong resemblance to the style of his friend Brandon Graham but my first exposure was the spot he landed after making a huge evolutionary leap: the toxic colors and bold, intricate line-work of 'Orc Stain: Volume 1'. The fourth name on that list is James Stokoe. The dangerous levels of awesomeness emitted by Rafael Grampa: no cerulean blue thunderbolts they just didn't have the bombastic style or apparent originality of an artist like Rafael Grampa - for example. Other artists - some of whom I like just as much or better - usually start strong, but gradually convince me of their genius as the story progresses. In the last several years, there's only been a handful: Michael Deforge's 'Lose' Jesse Jacob's 'Even the Giants' Theo Ellsworth's 'Capacity' and Rafael Grampa's 'Mesmo Delivery'. Opening the cover and flipping through the pages of James Stokoe's 'Orc Stain: Volume 1' was one of those rare instances that the artist's style triggered a cerulean blue thunderbolt of aesthetic revelation, arcing from printed page to optical cortex.

Orc Stain, Vol. 1 by James Stokoe