Crowded #1 Review

Writer: Christopher Sebela / Artist: Ro Stein / Image Comics Image releases its newest bleak fantasy about the future this week in Crowded #1. Written by Christopher Sebela and drawn by Ro Stein, this book takes a different turn than what I’m used to from an Image book. Instead of a post-apocalyptic danger zone, we get a very recent future that could easily be our world in a decade or two. This creative team showcases a world dominated by smartphones, automated service at restaurants and self-driving cars. Charlotte Edison makes her living off of the new technology-driven economy of interconnected, sharing products and services through apps. She unexpectedly finds herself a target of a darker use of this culture. “Reapr” allows people to crowdfund assassinations, putting a public bounty on her head. What’s a girl to do? Luckily, there’s an app for that. “Dfend” connects bodyguards for hire with potential customers. Charlotte finds Vita Slater, who is considering taking her on as a client. Burgers, Bodyguards, and “BLAM!” This book is fun! It does a great job setting up the world through a description of Charlotte’s work day. It’s a series of dog walking, babysitting, clothes and car-sharing gigs. All of them, by the way, are plausible apps. I’d be surprised if any of them, save the assassination one, didn’t have a real life parallel somewhere. Recent technologies are sprinkled throughout the book as Vita and Charlotte get to know each other while simultaneously repelling murd…