I’ve been holding off on reviewing El Goonish Shive until the new artistic format had a few updates under its belt. When Dan Shive initially commented on shifting his artistic style to a full-page format, it looked like something that would work. The larger frames would give him more artistic freedom and allow him to develop the story more fully. He claimed it would release him of constraints he’d encountered in the half-page format which apparently were contributing to writer’s block. Upon seeing the implementation of this format in-comic, something in the back of my head said “this isn’t working.” Indeed, I’ve only noted a couple instances where it even came close to hitting the ball.

After thinking about it for a while (and noting that I’ve had a similar reaction to the shift in style for Penny & Aggie’s layout), I’ve realized a fundamental reason for my dislike. The full-page format actually slows the pacing of the comic. In doing so, it has caused a comic that has a tendency toward slowness (both story-wise and due to the frequent hiatuses it’s recently gone through) to crystallize like honey that’s been in the cabinet too long. The result is an ugly morass that looks unappetizing and doesn’t ignite my interest in the story anymore. For all of the flaws he found in the old artistic setup, there was one truly decent aspect to it: the entire comic fit on one page, allowing it to be read quickly and concisely.

The combination of glacial pacing and scrolling have resulted in my losing interest in the story even before I finish reading it. Indeed, the comic has also started using fewer panels with the new format, resulting in what little pacing there was to falter worse. Nor has the new format led to an increase of comic updates. Frequent delays have continued to plague EGS as Shive struggles to find the perfect positioning for characters and backgrounds. It feels like Shive is trying to show more with less effort, resulting in a story that has stalled out and refuses to restart. It was a decent experiment… but the new artistic style doesn’t work and should be abandoned.