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A Review of Rovik, A Star Wars Homage by Nairobi Collective Avandu.

Rovik is the story of a man once child soldier who’s present life is mired by his inescapable past. Its also set in the Star Wars universe but it’s much, much more than an homage to the franchise.

Rovik is a comic created by Nairobi collective Avandu, specifically, it’s written by Yvonne Wanyoike, Salim Busuru, Kendi Mberia and Illustrated by Salim Busuru. The comic borrows heavily from the collectives experience of living in Kenya and from African culture in general, both the past and present.

As I said this is more than fan fiction, It’s a riveting, human and personal story that is paced extremely well, all the while controlled by a looming sense of desperation and survival that you can all but taste. The story is set on the planet Dukongo, a planet that has been drained for its Agrocite by the empire so that they could build the Deathstar. Yeah that one.

Incessant mining of the planet has decimated it and now all the remains is the planets last mining town of Brazzaville, a lonesome bastion of the empire. The town is populated by those who didn’t have the means to leave and those who came to capitalise on the planets destabilisation.

The comic is split almost between expositional asides and the illustrated pages, and it does an amazing job of balancing these asides with the story itself, placing them between or after major events in the story. Though some of these asides can be pretty text heavy, they aren’t exactly necessary to the story so you could skip them however, I wouldn’t recommend that at all. Reading the asides provides an extra depth to the story that is only hinted and felt during the course of the story, as the asides detail Rovik’s life as a child soldier for the empire and the fate of those he once knew.

Theres a certain kind of stillness/objectivity to how they are written that makes them more absorbing in spite of their harrowing context. There’s such a good interplay too between these asides and illustrated pages, the abruptness with which some of these asides end and lead into an illustration heightens the drama intensely at times.

On another note, the characters designs are really well crafted, each character feels distinct and individualised by an exceptional level of intricacy poured into them by Salim Busuru. Each character exudes a uniqueness, the way they carry themselves, speak and react to each other, each element has been given thought to and it’s so impressive upon the reader.

The minimal use of text and dialogue throughout the comic allows the comic to breathe and it’s made all the more visually arresting because of it. It also allows the suspense to be built at a slow and eerie pace. There’s little foreboding moments that subtly change the tone of a scene for example, usually its simple things like an ominous expression or a change in the lighting. At times it has this western kind of feel, established by these slowly building moments of inaction and then sudden action so that when things do finally climax, it feels incredibly abrupt and vicious.

The severity of the situation continues to take you by surprise, theres a moment during a fight scene where a bad guys friend is killed and as he slumps to the ground, his friend screams in complete bewilderment. Its this slowing of pace during all the surrounding chaos that really ups the drama and tension of the situation.

I also want to draw your attention to the use of blood throughout the comic, theres a particular vibrancy in it and its usage throughout drives home the mortality and fragility of each character it appears on. Rovik is beaten severely and is so out of whack that by the end of the comic he can barely see, it adds a certain weight to the previous sequences and their consequences.

Lastly, the relationship between the Albino Lemari, Pazuzu, and Rovik is so beautifully handled that the metaphor never feels heavy handed, that metaphor being that these are both two damaged, abandoned and broken characters and its that shared commonality between the two that allows them to really understand one another on a deeper level. Again, the asides illustrate this relationship masterfully and add new dimensions to the relationship.

To present such a real and gritty story that is sadly a dreadful reality for many children across the globe in a fantastical world in a way that never seems to hamper the story, is all credit to the amazing ability of the Avandu team. I’m really looking forward to any and all future projects they have planned.