Category: Reviews

Hey Poptropicans – get ready for some secrets to be spilled to society!

In this post, the PHB takes on the latest Poptropica graphic novel release, The Secret Society, which came out this April.  You can get this book – the third in the series – on Amazon and some bookstores. This review will discuss the storyline, presentation, characters, and more – so be prepared for some (but not all) spoilers if you read on.

If you aren’t quite caught up with the plot, be sure to check out Mystery of the Map (the first in the series) both as an island you can play on Poptropica right now or read in graphic novel format (either on our Comics page or in the print version as a book). Following that is The Lost Expedition (the second book), for which we recently published a review here (and of course, you should check out the book as well).

And now, let’s get into the review!

Storyline

The story picks up where The Lost Expedition left off, with the kids trapped on board the mysterious Secret Society’s hovercraft. They finally reach their destination, the headquarters of the Secret Society, where they meet the leader Spencer Albright, who explains just enough of what’s going on for the kids to catch up. Here’s where we get the interesting knowledge of how exactly the Poptropica timeline works. Ready?

As Spencer Albright explains, Poptropica is a unique holding place for islands throughout the timeline of history to just chill, but interfering with their events could have major consequences, which is why the Protectors are there to stop such meddling. As we know from the previous books, Octavian has a time device and is doing some unlawful meddling – and it’s starting to have some negative side effects on history.

So, as Albright and the Protectors scramble to undo the damage – which isn’t going very well – the kids take it upon themselves to help. As worse comes to worse, tensions rise, and each character finds themselves struggling to work together, with personal reasons getting in the way.

Eventually, we get to face Octavian up close, who is seen ferrying the people he cares about, including a lover – the ones he is willing to destroy history to save. And with some explosive encounters, the kids – in particular, Oliver – finally figures out what he must do to put a stop to Octavian’s out-of-control attempts at control. But even still, they’re not out in the clear just yet… and that’s where we wait for book 4 to wrap up the tale.

Presentation

As with the other books, illustrator Kory Merritt brings a very distinct style to the pages, characterized by thin lines, gradient coloring, and comical details.

Although the art style is different from what we see in the Poptropica game, it fits into the comics. Often, facial expressions are exaggerated, sometimes to a point where they look a little odd, but that’s the way it goes. Personally, I find the textures and simple lines to be a bit hit-or-miss: while they can work quite well in some scenes (such as the depictions of the Aegis and volcanic lava), at other times they feel incomplete, with shapes merely given a little color.

Something that the illustrations do well in are the sweeping larger-scale panels, which depict whole scenes but also include little details, such as in the spread above of the hovercraft and its whimsical path and frightened seabirds. We also get to visit a couple of exciting places from history: ancient Egypt and Mount Vesuvius.

In addition, this book’s illustrations has some interesting little details embedded within! For example, there is a reference to the meme of Joseph Ducruex (Archaic Rap) hanging on one of Albright’s walls. Later, you can also catch Jorge reading a magazine with Dr. Hare’s portrait on it. What other tidbits did you catch?

Even the inside covers are cleverly done with maps, like the previous two books. This one is especially interesting, because unlike the other two books, they start and end with the same magical map – except with changes reflecting the beginning and end! In both, you can see that we’ve started and ended similarly – flying just above a certain island in the hovercraft.

Characters & Conflicts

In our review of book 2, The Lost Expedition, author Mitch Krpata left a comment about one of the main characters in book 3: “The Secret Society focuses a little more on Oliver, and his conflict about what leadership to follow.”

And indeed, Oliver is often faced with challenges with others. But he’s very determined about his convictions, even in the face of disagreements. There are a few times in the story when he’s conflicted with his sister Mya about the right thing to do. But the bigger question for him is, are his decisions any better than the villainous Octavian’s?

Mya, for her part, is unafraid of diving headfirst into places where she sees a possibility of saving people, sometimes ignoring the dangers that come with those options. Oliver adamantly opposes, but as things heat up (quite literally), he begins to realize that interference can be in his hands (again, quite literally).

Meanwhile, Jorge continues to be the self-concerned comic relief of the series, his mind often thinking more of food than the mission at hand. Still, as he continues to see his friends so invested in the issues surrounding them, he starts to care a little more as the story progresses. Perhaps we’ll see even more development from Jorge in the final book.

Early in this installment, we’re introduced to a new character, Spencer Albright, the leader of the Secret Society. Despite kidnapping our favorite trio, the Secret Society of Protectors turn out to be the good guys – at least as far as we can tell. As Spencer explains, their goal is to prevent people from meddling with history, protecting the strange timeline of islands of various time periods that randomly stop by in the realm of Poptropica. Nobody is allowed to intervene with the course of history.

The Secret Society headquarters houses an impressive collection of ancient artifacts from history, some of which later get erased. As dangers rise, Spencer – who we learn is descended from Egyptian nobility – finds his very existence a point of conflict as well.

We also meet Jonas, Spencer’s trusty right-hand man. He seems at first to be an easy-going fellow, happy to play his part in helping the Secret Society. However, as worse comes to worse, things get very personal for the protégé – and his actions become fraught with emotion, making his character’s development also an interesting one.

Finally, of course, there is Octavian, who brought the kids into this mess back in book 1. And now we see the reason he’s causing all this madness in the first place: he has a lover, and he’ll stop at nothing to get her back. We don’t know their story just yet, but we do know Octavian won’t stop bending history until they’re reunited.

Octavian also seems to have some history with Spencer Albright, and it’s clear the two don’t agree on the right approach for handling the power they have for controlling the timeline of history. So far, things have only turned into a real hot mess, leaving us to wonder how things will play out in the end.

Closing Thoughts: 4.5/5

On the whole, The Secret Society is an excellent continuation of the trio’s adventures from the earlier Poptropica graphic novels. While we had some questions answered, such as what exactly Octavian and the Secret Society was up to, we were opened up to new questions, like how Octavian and Spencer came to such drastically different views for operating the timeline. Because of the deeper insights into how Poptropica islands worked, I thought that this book contained more meat than the others so far.

I also was intrigued by the whole history-alteration plot, and the book raised interesting questions about how we might act towards things we could control, as well as things we couldn’t control. It brings up conflicts about systems put in place for protection, and about following our own gut versus listening to others. Though the story is fiction, it depicts a reality in our own world: we don’t get to choose the way everything is, but we do get to decide how we respond. And how we respond, of course, has ripples.

Oliver asks the very thought-provoking question, “Do we stop every bad thing that’s ever happened? Why do we get to decide?” Unless we have a time device like these characters do – and even for them, it is limited – we don’t get to undo everything we don’t like. We see these characters realizing that some things are within their control while recognizing that other things are not. And that’s something every one of us has to deal with, too.

The story contains both comedic moments and serious ones, and overall, it’s a fun book for any Poptropica fan. It’ll leave you hanging on for what comes next as we await the final book, The End of Time, coming out this fall of 2017…

Have you read The Secret Society yet? What do you think of the story, particularly with regard to what it says about the structure of the Poptropica universe? And would you change the course of history for any ulterior motive?

Share your thoughts, concerns, and criticisms in the comments below!

Keep popping,
–slantedfish 🐠

Hey guys, my name is Brave Tomato, and I’m here with a very special post. So in mid-August of last year, the second Poptropica graphic novel, The Lost Expedition, was released out to the world. You can pick up the book on Amazon.

Although a review has been a long time in coming, now that book 3 is out, it seems a good a time as any to share thoughts on book 2 – so here we go!

Warning: This post contains spoilers.

The Story

The Lost Expedition starts off where Mystery of the Map left off with our trio of Mya, Oliver, and Jorge trying to find their way home. After discovering that the map can’t take them straight home, they end up hopping from island to island, trying to find hints that could get them somewhere as well as stock up on food supplies to survive the journey. Among the islands that they visit at first was one populated by the Greek Amazons, and one revolving around William Shakespeare in London. Each island is set to a specific location and time period, it seems.

Meanwhile, Octavian had escaped the clutches of Viking imprisonment and is after the kids once again for the map. However, this time around, Octavian is not the only person the kids have to worry about – on each island, there is one inhabitant that has a sun tattoo on their wrist. These inhabitants are actually spies for a secret society, and they are bent on getting the kids out of the islands by any means necessary.

The main plot kicks in when the kids end up on a barren glacial wasteland as they end up coming across the failed voyage of the HMS Terror (which was an actual failed voyage that occurred in 1813, a thanks to Tall Cactus for telling me). Stuck on this island with nowhere to go – and with no idea who to trust, will the kids pull through it all?

Now, let me tell you, this is a very different type of book than Mystery of the Map was, and I’ll say that it was really well-crafted. This tone here is a tad more serious with heart-warming moments mixed in with plenty of jokes along the way. There is also a tad bit of suspense, considering you never know what the kids are going to run into next. I enjoyed the story of this book more than the first installment, since we’re not stuck in one island the whole time.

Although the main plot on the HMS Terror island doesn’t kick in until page 30, the opening does a good job establishing what the world of Poptropica in this context is like. It’s clear that each island revolves around a specific era and location, whether it would be Anatolia at 479 BC or the Globe Theatre at AD 1602. This becomes a major point for what Octavian is up to, which I’ll touch on later on. There were also aspects introduced during this part, such as the connection with the tattoos being discovered and establishing how the kids got food and winter clothes that will be put to future use.

As for the rest of the story that does feature the HMS Terror, it does a good job in establishing the topic of the novel: the value of leadership. I’ll go into more detail on that once I reach the Characters portion of the review since it is a very character-centric topic. The journey and developments within the story are very engaging, and you’re anticipating what’s coming next. Although there might be points where the plot may be predictable, the story acts as a stepping stone to what we can expect for what’s coming next.

The Presentation

Kory Merritt is back at it again with the illustrations, and there are plenty of highlights within the presentation of the novel. The best illustrations come out of the large structures that were featured in the story. From the Globe Theatre to the abandoned ship itself and the Parthenon at Anatolia, these were spectacles to look at.

The character designs were also visually interesting – I really liked how over the progress of both series, Octavian’s hair and outfit grew to be more disheveled as he met with failure after failure.  The new character designs were also cool to look at, from the Amazonian women of Anatolia, to the inhabitants at the Globe Theatre, to the crew of the HMS Terror.

Now for the action scenes – the best one has to be a scene at the Globe Theatre island when the kids are being pursued by both Octavian and that island’s Secret Society member on the rooftops. The leaps, the views from the chase, were all very cool to see, and it’s a nice change from the standard running on the ground moments. There were also appearances by this polar bear that also did a good job showing the suspense of the situation the characters.

The rest of the scenery is decent (there was not much to say about the glacial island since it’s just plain white snowy flatlands) with the exception of the mountain and the ship. All in all, the art style had more of a chance to shine here, since we get to see more than one place.

The Characters

The characters in The Lost Expedition reflect the topic of the novel, the value of leadership. And there is no character that emulates this topic more than Mya.

Mya is establishing herself to be the most primary out of the three protagonist kids of the series and she’s one of the strongest out of the cast. Over the course of the story, it is clear that she is the one that will develop the most out of the protagonists. After all, remember that she did have to step up as a leader since she’s not only one of the smarter out of the group, but she’s also the oldest – based on the knowledge that she is Oliver’s older sister and that Jorge is the same grade as Oliver. Overall, I felt that Krpata did a really good job with her.

Now let’s talk about the boys, Oliver and Jorge. Starting with Oliver, he’s still showing his establishment as an ego with a heart of gold and great brainpower. His interactions with Mya are really sibling-like, and of course with them being siblings, this works very well for them. They have their arguments, but they show that they do care for each other – in particular, one of the most impacting scenes for me was when the trio get caught in a snow storm and Mya is trying to reassure a scared Oliver.

As for Jorge, he’s had both his stronger and his weaker moments within the book. Sometimes, he talks without a filter and tended to be concerned only for himself – especially when it came to food. Other times, he’s just there for comic relief purposes – while comedy is subjective,  I felt that his comic relief moments were hit-or-miss. However, I won’t deny saying that Jorge’s weak moments are the weakest part of the graphic novel. There were parts where he became quite a lazy pain-in-the-butt.

Then there’s the Secret Society. Throughout their travels, the kids run into a variety of characters, one per island, who each have distinctive sun tattoos on their wrist. When one of them turns to capture the kids, we get an inkling of who they are and what their mission is – but not much. After all, the kids still don’t know what Poptropica is (and honestly, at this point in the tale, neither do we really – it certainly isn’t quite the Poptropica we know).

As for Octavian… hoo boy, howdy, we learn quite a bit more about Octavian in here than in the previous book. Not only is he still on constant pursuit of the kids. Not only is he getting more disheveled as the book goes along. Not only is he still clever and active as all heck. We also learn about his connection to the secret society, and the fact that he was a former member of it. Upon retrieving the map, he looks down upon it and grins that he’s coming home… to Pompeii at the year of Mount Vesuvius’s eruption.

I had a feeling that Octavian was in the same society as “Embed” (whose actual name is Nils), but his name foreshadowed that he was originally the Secret Society member for AD 79 Pompeii. He’s certainly up to something… and it may get personal!

Conclusion: 4/5 brave tomatoes

Overall, The Lost Expedition makes its mark as a continuation of the adventure that began with Mystery of the Map (not only the first Poptropica graphic novel in the series, but also an island you can play!). We’re taken through several interesting locations, meet lots of distinctive (and some mysterious) characters, all while being able to stay amused by the antics of our three protagonists – some more obnoxious than others!

While we continue to delve into what the world of Poptropica really is all about, The Lost Expedition certainly leaves some questions unanswered – but after all, that’s what a good book does. You’ll definitely want to pick up book 3, The Secret Society, after this read, and let the journey continue…

–Brave Tomato

EDIT: The author, Mitch Krpata, has left a comment on this review regarding the analysis of Mya! Here’s what he had to say:

This means a lot, BT! Mya was closest to my heart in writing this book. At its core I really wanted the story to be about Mya accepting the responsibility of leading the group, and it’s gratifying to see that it came through.

The Secret Society focuses a little more on Oliver, and his conflict about what leadership to follow. I hope you like that one, too.

How awesome is that??? 😀