JACK'S WEBCOMIC LOVE JUNKBLOG

O SARILHO

Jun 15, 2024

Author: Shizamura
Page Count: 460+
Start Date: November 2016
Genre: Post-Apocalyptic, War Drama, Sci-Fi
Style: Full color, Painted, Mixed Media
Language: English, Portuguese
Hosting: Self Hosted
Status: Ongoing

Warning! This review contains spoilers.

Spoilers are hidden behind a , and can be revealed by hovering (desktop) or tapping (mobile).

O Sarilho is not for casual readers.

This webcomic won't hold your hand – it throws you right in the middle of a complex ceasefire between two keyed up, futuristic European empires. These are the sea-facing, aggressively expansionist Imperial Meditia Augusta, and the psychic corpse-puppeting Lusitania. A ginger guy hooks himself up to a computer, bleeding from the nose and talking to the god of all known information. A spicy little Napoleon-ass captain pushes his troops on an aggressive mission into enemy territory. This other girl wants to set an old car on fire. ...just what is going on here?

O Sarilho takes place in a distantly post-apocalyptic world, missing much of our modern technology, but having engineered new, futuristic devices like laser guns. We don't know what caused the apocalypse, or what kind of technology exactly is missing. But well-off politicians are scheming, and emotions are running high. War is brewing.

This is where our story begins...

In a Lusitanian buffer zone bordering the Meditia, a space ship crash lands. The ship cannot be identified by the all-knowing internet god, which shocks Captain Nikita and his Meditian soldiers. His country craves this 'satellite' for it may hold secrets to technology that can further advance the empire and maybe overthrow the Lusitanians. Ergo, Nikita leads his troops on a dark and moody crawl to the crash site under cover of nightfall. The troops discover the mystery ship is not only alien in nature, but AND

Lusitanian snipers catch wind of this ruckus and get in a deadly battle with Nikita's squad.

What follows is a heart wrenching, sad, violent spiral into

The characters can be endearing, especially the timid mortician Ângela - and even Nikita, at first - but this story is more out to hurt your feelings, I think. It's a war drama; everybody's got skeletons in their closet. Nikita is busy making them out of his enemies and the Lusitanians are using their reanimated remains as soldiers. What fun! The romance between Nikita and Steffano has been compared to reading fanfiction about politicians, and, honestly? Yeah. I've never read one but now I feel like I have. These guys are messed up, in a complicated way - Shizamura will get you invested in some truly slimy, powerful people, in a much more hands on intimate way than the typical political war drama tends to. This, I really enjoy.

Every good story needs a strong emotional core. No amount of 'rule of cool' will do if you don't care about the characters. Lucky for us, O Sarilho has an enormous cast of big personalities - we got a delusional little warmonger, a sweet-pea mortician, a heartthrob politician, an enlisted daughter bound by duty to her family, a fashionable computer nerd, a cold-as-ice government interrogator, and a , to name a few...

The story gives us a glimpse of both sides, though - later on we jump to the Lusitanians. What could these people have done to deserve the Meditia's ire? Well this isn't hollywood, darlings - this is a lovingly crafted indie comic with grey morality, and that means the characters are reanimating corpses I mean, ah- uh- a little fucked up. Just a bit. That's not what the war is about, but, you know. When you meet Eurico you'll understand.

Eurico haunted by images of The Foreigner. (By far, my favourite page.)

Here we go behind enemy lines and see , controlling it like it is their own. This is where the story really hit its stride for me. As I've mentioned with other webcomics, we tend to have a bit of a slow start while we find our footing. O Sarilho isn't slow, but it hits you with an onslaught of worldbuilding, jargon, and cultural information that can be difficult to parse; for those of us who like to be challenged by stories, this is a welcome change of pace. The subplot also treats us to some of the best intimate character moments in the story. It is a great reward for sticking with the comic through the more convoluted early parts. But don't think that means its easier to understand, no - Shiza gives you no break in her thirst for loretelling power, and her artwork evolution is absolutely insane. The author isn't afraid to get experimental. She uses maps and scientific diagrams as backgrounds, animated panels, incredible effects for portraying mental struggles, and dresses her characters in a runway show of dazzling, sharp outfits. If you, too, are a bit into military chic and history, you're gonna get a kick out of these designs.

Shizamura's knack for creativity can't be contained to her pages, though. The glitch effects, aesthetics and patterns leap from the bounds of the page, and seep into the website design itself. Since you're here on Neocities, you'll appreciate that this artist is a talented coder. She's a master of setting the mood with color and design. She incorporates this ethos into everything; the color scheme, font choice, navigation buttons, the title - everything! For example, look at how these shaky title letters and pitch black background heighten Nikita's delusion and fear - and compare it to this porcelain, neurotically clean, patterned background for the scenes set in the Lusitanian Medical School.

A story with a highly customized website, emotional turmoil, disturbing themes, heavy worldbuilding, and pleasing character designs. What more is there? Give it a read, and you'll see. Dear Franquelim - the mouthepiece for the god of information - will loredump to you about the horrors of the world. The morally bankrupt Lusitanian medical institution will show you creative uses for a corpse, and Nikita will demonstrate what's gotta be the most healthy coping mechanism for grieving your loved one's death: start a war.

If you're into Star Wars: The Clone Wars or Asimov's The Gods Themselves, then this comic is for you. Superpowers, futuristic fight scenes, political villainy, and a lust for revenge - O Sarilho is a deeply crafted, dark slow burn that will make you ship war criminals. Can't reccommend it enough.

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