I did a live-read summary after each scene to provide some thoughts while reading and to answer each question as it comes up in the story.
Scene 1:
The Hacker scene was a little hard to understand at first, but I think that's mainly because it could have used a few more panels to established the context. Some details can be inferred as the events progress. But possibly, instead of one panel that has to do all of the heavy lifting of establishing the hostages, there could be additional shots to stress the danger they're in and the crowd/camera the Criminal is speaking to (and how those people react).
It was also initially unclear to me if The Hacker had been posing as a hostage the entire time. I would assume so, but maybe he could be shown among the group first so it's clearer when he stands and confronts the Criminal that this was him infiltrating the plan.
When I got to the part about the warring armies, however, I was more disoriented. My guess was that both sides had always been on the streets below, and had they been watching the Criminal's speech until the Hacker revealed himself and are now fighting it out. But it feels like some context is missing as to why those armies were assembled. That's where I think shots of the crowd earlier on could have helped to maybe zoom in on these factions, show their reactions, and provide more clues as to their aims.
It was otherwise a good introduction to E-den itself to establish that it's a tech-heavy, crime-filled world. There's some hint of corruption, unrest, ect. A lot remains a mystery, but it's fast-paced enough to still act as a nice snapshot before all of the pieces come together.
Scene 2?:
Initially, I wasn't sure what Stray was trying to accomplish. He wanted to climb the building and fails. There's a cute aside that showcases that he's essentially a 'ghost' in this world. And then he goes back to trying to climb the building, there's a montage of his failed attempts, and then Lions approaches him from off-screen. But it was unclear what scaling the building is as a goal. As in, I knew that he is making these attempts, but I didn't know why, so it was initially hard to connect to the scene and Stray's struggle.
It will probably be clearer once it's drawn, but I didn't follow the panels where a picture appears on Stray's screen. It felt like too much of a jump for him to forget Lions (who is the first person he's been able to communicate with in a long time), and get distracted by the screen to the point that he doesn't notice Lions walking over to him. Maybe, too, it could have helped if Strays had checked the panel for signs of the Hacker sooner so it was more established that he is invested enough in that information to get distracted.
I also am confused about the dynamic between Strays and Lions. As in, I don't know what motivates Lions to want to stay with and help Strays beyond general sympathy. And I don't know why Strays says he 'can't stand' Lions when that was never actually depicted. He was frightened to talk to a person after so long, but was generally thankful to Lions for putting him at ease until suddenly he now hates him when... Lions offers to help?
Scene 3?:
In the last scene, Lions didn't believe hackers were real. But now he's convinced he will make Stray a hacker? He suddenly has knowledge about how hackers' abilities work. It's possible that he knew this all along and just withheld it, but the panels don't really establish this as a steady progression of events. He just knows all of this and has become Stray's mentor for reasons that still feel unclear. And I don't know why Stray believes his training method is legitimate if he both 'can't stand' him and heard Lions say hackers don't exist.
The emotional build-up to Stray's anger is sorta undermined by all of this. The 'what' and 'why' are both hazy, so I struggle to connect on a deeper level.
He gets upset when his hand clips through the wall, but maybe it's because I don't understand the hacker abilities yet, but isn't that a good thing? As in, hackers would be able to clip through walls. So, the fact that Stray managed this means that Lions' advice actually did work. But he pushes him away regardless? He was otherwise getting hurt falling off the building multiple times, so I don't understand his reasoning that "when I'm alone, nothing hurts me". He's been alone a long time and gets hurt anyway.
Conceptually, I like the panels getting progressively smaller. But because the emotions feel irrational, it doesn't make good use of what's otherwise a cool idea. There would need to be a bigger consequence to Strays interacting with others. Because, as it stands, he was still better off with Lions than he was climbing and falling off the building on his own. On a deeper level, it could signify him hindering his own success due to his insecurities, but there hasn't been enough time to really establish Stray as a character for that to have emotional pay-off.
Scene 4?:
I do really like the scene of Lions' ban being lifted while he's helping Stray achieve his goal. The panels showing them more distant from each other is a great touch to show that something has gone amiss. The only dilemma is that these characters haven't been shown to have developed a friendship over trials and tribulations so it ends up ringing hollow. In the last scene, Stray had rejected him and his help. Now he ran back to Lions to continue their training, and suddenly Lions' ban has been lifted. The bones are all there, but the meat tying it all together is missing—if that makes sense?
Either way, I had some mixed feelings about the reveal that hackers also can not see Stray. On one hand, it creates some situational irony that the goal Stray sought is revealed to not be the solution he thought it would be. But because it was never really clear what hackers do or why Stray has searched for them since he was a child, I'm also not sure what he was expecting?
He says he always got the sense that hackers looked out for people. He's putting a lot of stock in these hackers being the solution to his problems which seem to be mainly internal (anxiety, agoraphobia, etc). But the first scene mostly showcased hackers as crime fighters. So, I don't know what they would specifically do for him. Maybe he thought they could lift his ban? But there still hasn't been any clear clues as to how he got banned in the first place.
As for the fight scene, it's—again—on the surface super cool. But the details don't hold up to scrutiny. Stray, after one training montage which only really taught him how to clip through walls to climb the building, is supposed to be able to go toe-to-toe with a hacker. Granted, Lions could have just gone easy on him. But it doesn't feel like satisfying pay-off for the protagonist to not have really worked for or 'earned' their big fight.
By the end, there are a lot of looming questions. Some make for cool mysteries to explore later (like why Stray got banned, what becomes of him now, etc). Others still make it harder to feel invested. I still don't have a clear sense of the protagonist's goals, and it feels like a lot of establishing detail got skipped over. The big moments are all there, but it needs more fleshing out to connect those parts so the events themselves match the emotions.
