London Loves Comics Contraband Review

Given Contraband is mainly set in London, we figured we'd see what Dom Sutton from London Loves Comics thought about Contraband...


"Behe has some interesting things to say about the world we live in and the one we’re heading for and Contraband contains enough good ideas to suggest that he could be a name to watch. His cause is aided by artist Phil Elliott whose clean style is reminiscent of Julien Opie’s work. Elliott's pictures are beautifully simple and provide a refreshing counterpoint to the complicated story...."

Contraband Review at Comics Bulletin

A big fan of Phil's art work, Steven Bari throws a few cooler phrases to describe the script of Contraband at Comics Bulletin.


"Comic artist since 1981, Elliot has incredible skill at capturing placid humanity--the vulnerable, common person--which works very well given the subject matter of Contraband. Elliot’s previous works are similarly humanistic, such as Illegal Alien for Dark Horse Comics. He has a clean line work that is defined by thick inking--giving the page a sketchy look. It’s his storytelling, the intricate detail of a scene and fluidity of the panels that hold this book together. As Tucker, Plugger, and Toby drive across a London intersection, Elliot captures the readers’ interest with elaborate rows of homes that line the thoroughfare--showcasing ordinary life juxtaposed to the three turgid characters whose lives are consumed by mobile video sharing...."

ComixFan Reviews Contraband

A recent review from Kevin Sutton at ComixFan. He's from Sudbury, a small city just west of where I was born - and it's really cool to see the GN make it up to Northen Ontario (for reference, it's that vast barren space you see on the Canada map directly above Toronto).


"The whole story is very provoking and is put together well as a straight thriller in addition to the broader morality play. If you have any interest in tech thrillers or thinking men’s stories, this is worth a read...3.5 /5"

Contraband Reviewed in Financial Times

We're quite pleased to see that Contraband has been given a short but favourable review by James Lovegrove in this weekend's edition of the London Financial Times. You can read the review at FT.com


Contraband is now in the shops and available to order online from the likes of Amazon, Play, Tesco and Slg's own online store.

Grovel UK Contraband Review

Andy Shaw from UK graphic novel review site Grovel pulls out some pros & cons about Contraband giving Phil's slick art a solid 4 out of 5 score.


"Most good science fiction is based on an extrapolation of the future, which has a plausible basis in current society. Contraband’s basic premise does this quite well, starting with internet video sites like YouTube and looking at how they could, eventually, become a nightmare."

Comixology's Peter Jaffe Reviews Contraband

Peter Jaffe from Comixology recently checked out Contraband and had a few things to say about the GN's artwork and narrative.


"The artwork by Phil Elliott (with inks by Ian Sharman and gray tones by Cherie Donovan) has a cartoony feel that consciously focuses attention on the foreground image; faces of characters standing behind the speaker become progressively less detailed as they move farther back in the panel, while important moments are emphasized by a startling realism....the dialogue is nicely written and entertaining, if unremittingly cynical. It does have the effect of making everyone sound like a philosopher, though."

Contraband Review at Newsarama

Here are a few words from Michael May regarding the comic...


"There are rewards for those willing to stick with the book. For one thing, Behe has a great voice in all that text. People in Contraband don’t talk the way real people do, but that’s just fine. They talk better than real people do. They tend to go on and on (Tucker especially loves to speechify and given that he’s usually threatening people at the same time, there were several instances when I wondered why someone didn’t just jump him mid-lecture), but they sure are entertaining as they’re doing it."

Graphic Novel Review at The Pulse

Jen Contino at The Pulse dropped us a line a few weeks back regarding Contraband.

Contraband Podcast Interview at CGS

Last week, the guys at ComicGeekSpeak touched base to discuss Contraband's themes, background and general stuff about how it all came together.



A bit of background into Contraband's dialogue development:

"TB - I wanted the dialogue to mimic the behaviour of youths posting bits of conversation on mobile social networking channels. Looking through these mobile forums, I’m amazed how many users kind of “step up onto their soapbox” - offering up rather raw and lengthy opinions on how they feel about a specific topic. These meaty (and often passionate) digressions are accompanied with personal signatures, banners - perhaps some sort of animated icon or other digital representation of themselves. The characters in Contraband (active, ambitious, mobile savvy) fit into this category of forum users so it seemed appropriate to bring this across into the comic narrative.”

Graphic Novel Featured at Wired.com

Just had an email letting us know Contraband picked up a recommendaton in the latest issue of Wired online:


"Cell phone geeks will want to pick up Thomas Behe’s new graphic novel Contraband, in which a band of mercenaries return home from war only to get entangled in an underground mobile video network that pays out jackpot-sized fees to sabotage-minded citizen journalists who capture and upload the most twisted, violent footage. The sci-fi thriller unfolds amidst vengeful relationships, insatiable desire, public outrage and mobiles that pack 1,000-volt electric nodes, pepper spray capability and best of all a fully functioning pistol with detachable silencer. Steve Jobs: take note." Todd Jatras

France Comics Interview

Met this top chap Christophe Colin from France Comics a few months back at Angouleme who scribed a quick interview of Contraband's development. Folks keen to see a french version of a Contraband sample can drop us a line and we'll get a free pdf off to you asap...

Contraband Preview at The First Post

Here's another short review of Contraband at The First Post...


This is an extract from Danny Graydon's review:

"Eschewing the dark, moody artwork that typically accompanies such stories, Elliott adopts an engaging clear-line style which slickly captures the fast-paced netherworld of phone-video..."

Gutter Geek Reviews Contraband

Contraband will officially be hitting the streets in a matter of days but we are starting to get some advance reviews and here's one that has appeared on guttergeek.com



We're pleased that the reviewer has really got to the heart of our book... here's a little bit of what he's said...

"(Contraband) actually takes us into some murky ethical territory, refusing the easy glamorization of the rawest energies of internet culture. Downloading pirated music isn’t ethically suspect here because of the infringement on record company property rights, but because of the off-shore sites that have set up troubling partnerships with mercenary forces and despotic governments. At its most daring, the book even draws some sharp lines between the Blackwaters of W’s “new” wars and the exploitation of violence and spectacle for entertainment and profit. “People,” folk-hero Jarvis declares to a teaming rally, “we can now confirm that a number of these hired guns are directly responsible for the surge in mobile abuse we are seeing today.” Like the best works in the genre of speculative fiction, Contraband is less interested in the “What If” that frames its narrative, than in approaching the present at an acute angle. And whichever side of the new culture wars shaping up in this 21st century you might find yourself, Behe will provide you little comfort."

Contraband Interview at Comixology

Peter Jaffe from the comics news and review site Comixology has an interview with us HERE.


Here's is an extract from the interview:

Comixology: In reading Contraband, one of the first comparisons that comes to mind is "A Clockwork Orange". It's a world where kids have taken to committing random acts of violence in order to entertain themselves. Could you tell us about the influences that went into Contraband? And, what inspired you to tell this story?

Thomas: The idea came about while working on a user-generated project at a UK mobile operator. Some sneaky kid had upskirting a woman on an underground train and posted the clip on our network. So while top management were blowing their nut and the tech team began implementing an age-verification layer, I was thinking how some nasty bloke could probably offer a good revenue share to motivate sh*t-disturbing kids to send in more.
I thought up this violent channel called Contraband, a sort of "urban theatre", where youths prowl city streets secretly film strangers then post sensational, erotic and violent mobile videos. So men can no longer shower in gyms. Women in dresses avoid seats on trains. Teens run daily exhibitionist mobile blogs featuring candid clips of close friends and family members. User-generated mobile spy-cam content becomes big business as society demands increasingly radical videos.
But it's also tough to police corrupt individuals like Tucker because it's not in the mobile operator's best interest to do so. They've beaten the government (ID card), internet community portals and banks in the race to create robust personal profile to track people, sell them products, invade their privacy for commercial gain. So it all kind of spirals out of control...

Grab Contraband Graphic Novel at SlaveLabor.com

Just a quick note from France to let folks know the first few Contraband books are now available at SLG's online book store.

Phil Elliott Q&A at Comics Village

In his latest Village Gossip column, UK comics guru Craig Johnson asks Phil 20 rapid-fire questions about his latest work, tastes, the cleanliness of his hands (!?) and this rather nervy encounter with some Watchmen artwork:

"The scariest package I ever received contained a piece of original artwork by Dave Gibbons - a painting of The Comedian from Watchmen for the cover of a UK magazine, Arkensword 22 that I had to do the lettering separations for. I'd never done anything like this before and was shit-scared that I was going to ruin it all. Turned out okay though."


Check out the whole interview at Comics Village - where its Page 45 column has also made Contraband one of the top preview titles for Feburary.

Bringing Contraband into Belgium

Scanning through the bdangloume.fr site I can see that this is indeed one monster show - it is said to be 2nd largest comic event in the world with nearly 1/2 million fans invading this tiny french town east of Bordeaux. And I'm amazed how many small indy Belgian pubishers say they'll show up looking for unique albums of sequential art. So we've created a Flemish/Dutch version with the help of a solid chap I met on comicspace.com: Rembrand Le Compte - who was nice enough to translate the first few pages into Flemish for us last Fall. He's currently working on his own sequential art and reporting on the latest and greatest of the thriving Belgian market - so when you get a sec, go check him out here.

Contraband Interview at Newsarama

A few weeks back we spoke with Chris Arrant from Newsarama about Contraband's key themes, the unique experience of working together and some insights around character development and tone. You can read this interview over on Newsarama. Here's a quick excerpt:


NEWSARAMA: Contraband premiered on SLG's Eyemelt.com digital comics website, and the print edition is coming out in February. What led you two to working with SLG, and what are your thoughts of going online first prior to print?

TB: Contraband was originally a 130-min film screenplay but I wanted to touch base with a few professional artists about developing the story into a multi-issue comic. There were many innovative manga and cyber-punk styles coming out today - but I was really attracted to Phil’s work. I guess his Euro-style it’s a bit like the “ligne clair” art many French and Belgian creators focus on.

PE: I’ve got a lot of respect for Slave Labor. They’re one of the few independent publishers that have weathered the various storms that have buffeted the comics industry. I’ve worked with them on other projects and was pleased that they wanted to publish Contraband.

TB: I was very excited when SLG picked up Contraband. Our intention was to release a 140+ page graphic novel in the New Year but when Dan Vado told us about his growing SLG digital site Eyemelt.com we were dead keen to get an issue out there for folks to read online. Click here for more...

Promotion Video for Contraband GN

We've been in touch with one of the UK's top 3D animation artists to create some promotial video material for Contraband. A preview sample of some early results can be seen on the side panel (INTRO). We're really pleased with what's arrived so far. The artist Koutsoliotas Kostas created nearly all animation material for the BBC in 2007 (Match of the Day, 2012 Olympic promos and heaps of reality TV bits). And he also did some solid work on that Red Star graphic novel/ PS2 video game a few years back. Check out his stuff at www.koutsoliotas.com.

Interview with Canadian comic critic Tyson Durst

A few weeks back, Tyson Durst interviewed Phil & I where we kicked around a few issues relating to mobile phone abuse. Here's how it turned out:


"When people think of contraband, they typically picture illegal goods such as street drugs or guns. But in today’s society, where portable digital technology is commonplace, the distribution of explicit, violent reality content is the new contraband of the 21st century. Writer Thomas Behe and artist Phil Elliott explore this emerging and disturbing underground world in a new graphic novel of the same name." Click here for more...